


those cunning folk

by lucy_blue



Series: those cunning folk [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 90's Culture, Canonical Child Abuse, Draco Malfoy Being a Brat, Draco Malfoy Speaks French, Harry Does Not Trust Dumbledore, Harry Potter & Ron Weasley Friendship, Hermione Granger is a Good Friend, Hogwarts Inter-House Friendships, One Big Happy Weasley Family, Parseltongue, Professor Snape is still a nasty jerkface who we all hate at least a little bit, Ravenclaw Hermione Granger, Slytherin Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings References, i'm so glad these are actually tags
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-22
Updated: 2018-05-26
Packaged: 2019-03-22 14:50:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 50,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13766460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucy_blue/pseuds/lucy_blue
Summary: Harry Potter's first friend is the garter snake that lives in Mrs. Figg's backyard. Harry Potter likes the family from the platform, but the redheaded kid doesn't seem to like his snake too much, and Harry sits with other people.That's all it takes to change things.Harry Potter is Sorted into Slytherin. The world is slightly different.





	1. measure of normalcy

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Harry Potter. I may sometimes borrow phrases from the book, but I'll try not to use anything too long, and the reason I'm doing that, is I want this to have the same sort of feel to it as the original book. I hope you enjoy!

Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of Number Four, Privet Drive, were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. Mr. Dursley was a large man with a mustache he was very proud of, and almost nothing by way of neck. He worked at a firm called Grunnings, which did work which had to do with drills, and therefore was the most manly office work you could possibly encounter. 

Mrs. Dursley was a skinny, tall woman with a horsey face. She also had a neck rather longer than average, but it came very useful in peering through the upper story windows to spot what exactly the neighbors were up to now. She stayed at home, cooking and cleaning and hosting tea parties to show off her good sense of style and gossip about other neighbors’ slightly less impeccably normal lives. Mostly she worked to make sure her son and husband would have everything they could possibly want when they came home from work and school. 

Dudley Dursley was also perfectly normal. He was rather larger than normal, which used to get him very nasty bullying from some real pieces of work, some true hooligans, punks who really should be given a whipping, at school. Sometimes the neighbors remarked to each other about it, but they couldn’t very well starve him, could they? He wasn’t so good in school, but as Mr. Dursley would say, only swotty girls cared over much about school, and he made quite a few friends, and stopped those punks from saying things about him quite quickly, with a few punches that Mr. Dursley quite praised. Mr. and Mrs. Dursley were very proud of their son.

Everything would be perfect, except there was a fourth person in Number Four, Privet Drive, and they weren’t normal at all. It would take a little while to notice the fourth person in the house, as there were no pictures of this fourth person, and the problem person was usually busy cleaning, or if they were done, put away into their cupboard. 

If you managed to get a look at Harry Potter, you would see at once there was something wrong. He was abnormally small and skinny for his age, and dwarfed by the huge, old clothes that he had to wear. His knees were knobby and his forehead was adorned with a lightning bolt scar which was a bright white against his skin. He had wild curly hair which didn’t care for brushes or whatever the Dursleys tried on it, and brilliant green eyes that stood out very sharply. 

He looked odd, but it wasn’t just that- it was the funny things that happened around Harry Potter.

The Dursleys were good, kind, people who took him in despite this. They assigned him plenty of chores (‘to build character,” the dad in those comics Dudley never read would say) and even more if he messed the original chores up. If he didn’t finish enough of his chores, he didn’t get much food. But it made sense, didn’t it? If their hanger-on nephew didn’t pull his weight that day, he didn’t deserve dinner. 

Harry worked hard to finish all his chores. Harry stayed exactly one half letter grade behind Dudley. Harry avoided Dudley’s gang, often hiding in the school library, as the librarian there wouldn’t stand for Dudley and his gang talking in the library. Harry made cover up stories for the bruises he got from being pinched or sometimes slapped, or whatever, because he knew no one else had strange things happen around them, so it stood to reason no one else got slapped around or pinched as much as he did. 

Once, Harry was running from Dudley’s gang, and he found himself on the roof of the school building, somehow. He figured it must be an odd gust of wind, or something, but the school teacher, who already didn’t like him, figured he’d been climbing school property, and the Dursleys figured he’d done something “freakish”. Between the two of them Harry got a month of detention, and a week “home sick”, being locked in the cupboard with only a little water and scraps each day, being let out twice a day to go to the bathroom. 

When he was finally out of his cupboard, the detention prevented Harry from doing all his chores, so for that month Harry got a little less food at home, and Aunt Petunia started to pinch harder, and more often, telling Harry not to be so ungrateful when every his face flinched into a twisted knot with the pain of not enough food. Harry at least got a full lunch at school, which he scarfed down lightning-quick, before Dudley and his gang could steal it. 

One day after school, he had been so dizzy and lightheaded, he had fainted. Even Aunt Petunia had looked worried about his state, and for the entire day after that, she had let him eat portions the size of what one of Dudley’s friends would get and even rich things like ice cream, and greasy pizza, without doing any chores. But the rich food on his previously mostly empty stomach was too much and he had thrown up everywhere. After that, she had been much less nice- it was right back to chores, and his first one was to clean up his own throw up. 

When his detention was finally over, Harry was very glad, even though it meant back to chores for him. When Harry cooked dinner, he could sneak little bites of vegetables as he chopped them, or “test” whether the past was cooked properly four or five times. It was nice to get something other than the dry bread spread with a very thin layer of peanut butter he usually got, or a small pile of leftover scraps. Harry could get covert sips of water from the tap or hose, when he was cleaning or gardening, too. 

Gardening, too, Harry had a little bit more freedom, as Aunt Petunia didn’t watch him so closely. Harry would often talk to himself, or quietly sing little fragments of music he’d ran into- jingles from the TV he’d heard while cleaning, or music Mrs. Figg liked, or a song from the radio. 

Harry was absentmindedly singing the jingle for a brand of cleaning wipes Aunt Petunia really liked, when he almost stepped on a little garden snake. “Sssorry, sssorry, little guy,” Harry murmered absently. “Didn’t mean to almost ssstep on you like that. You’re okay, aren’t you, you little fella? You should probably get out of the garden, though, Aunt Petunia won’t much care for you.”

The snake didn’t move for a moment, and Harry wondered if he should try to pick up the snake, and if that would lead to a poisonous bite, when the snake replied. 

“You can ssspeak?” 

“You can talk?” Harry replied in surprise. 

“Obviously. But how can you, a human, talk?” 

“I’m not doing anything,” Harry said at once. “But even though I’m not doing anything, I need to ssshut up, or Aunt Petunia will punisssh me sssomething nasssty.” Harry turned back to gardening, intending to ignore the snake and thereby avoid getting into trouble, but the snake stayed there, staring at him. 

“Look,” Harry hissed, “You need to leave. Go out under that white picket fence. There might be sssome food there. I can’t help you more than that, okay? Now leave.” 

The snake still didn’t move. Harry covertly nodded to the fence again, and after another moment, the snake slithered under it into Mrs. Figg’s yard. 

Harry breathed a sigh of relief, figuring he had just prevented something truly freaky from happening. Fear of the cupboard allowed him to now further enjoy the bright, fresh air, and he worked rather contentedly for the rest of the day. 

He was out in the garden two weeks later when the small snake returned. 

“What, is there not food there?” Harry asked, after glancing around to make sure Aunt Petunia wasn’t anywhere nearby. 

“There are fluffy animalsss. They bring in mice to their human, but their human doesss not eat them, ungrateful mute animal that it isss. Ssso I ate them,” The snake said. “But the fluffy animalsss have long clawsss, and they ssspeak nonsssense.” 

“I really can’t talk,” Harry insisted. “If Aunt Petunia ssseesss you-” 

“I will bite her,” The snake said. “I am good at hiding.”

Harry glanced nervously over his shoulder. “Look, you really can’t.” 

Finally, the snake left, tail twitching in irritation, but they were back in a few days, bugging Harry even more. The little snake started just talking at Harry, and refusing to leave. She- it turned out they were a she- introduced herself as Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, and told Harry about her home, and a strange journey all wrapped up, which Harry realized meant Uncle Vernon and his friends had accidently kidnapped a small snake on their last camping trip. She was sure Harry was speaking the snake language; but Harry feebly protested that it could be Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk. 

Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk never got angry at how strange it was, this cross-species communication, so eventually Harry relaxed around her. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk would talk about hunting, or the newest weird thing Mrs. Figg’s cats had done, and Harry would pet her and try to explain human things and concepts, which usually led to Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk saying “huh, that’sss really weird” and Harry shrugging and realizing humans kind of were.

During the summer, Harry was allowed, even encouraged, to go walking in the neighborhood, as long as he did his chores. Aunt Petunia was glad for the time she got to pretend he didn’t exist, and Harry enjoyed the freedom, so it worked out pretty well. Harry started carrying around Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk in his hoodie, showing her the sights and sounds of the park. 

Harry was sitting on a park bench, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk casually hanging round his neck. Harry was pretty distracted, trying to get Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk to admit that cats weren’t necessarily all completely evil. Harry was so distracted, he didn’t even notice that there was someone else there, until they spoke. 

“So, what are you and your snake friend talking about?” 

Harry flinched, turning to stare at the person who’d spoken. The person was female, which surprised Harry considering how husky her voice was, until Harry saw the cigarette dangling from her fingers. 

She was one of the fellow neighborhood weirdos, judging by her skintight, black ripped jeans, thick black eyeliner, and cigarette. Harry saw her undercut and realized this must be the Taylors’ daughter, the one Aunt Petunia kept on gossiping about- Courtney. Harry heard she went to Stonewall, having not gotten good enough grades to get into a private school, like the rest of the neighborhood. 

“Um,” Harry said, realizing he’d been quite too long. “I’m trying to persuade her not to be afraid of cats.” 

“Wait,” she said, letting smoke slowly float out of her mouth, “Are you telling me-” she hesitated, “You’re seriously talking to that snake? Not just hissing random shit to play around?” 

“Um,” Harry said again, coughing at all the smoke. 

“Harry, what’sss going on?” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk asked. “Do you need me to bite her?” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk slithered out of Harry’s hoodie and eyed Courtney Taylor threateningly. 

“Ssshe realized I’m talking to you. I don’t know? Maybe? Don’t bite her yet.” Harry eyed her warily. “Look, you can’t tell anyone,” Harry pleaded. “My aunt would be so mad at me for- for- uh, f-faking talking to snakes, you know.” 

“Okay, okay,” she said hastily. “You are talking to that snake, though, right? Because if so, that’s like- so cool.” 

“Yes,” Harry said after a moment. “Her name is Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk.” 

“Sseleshichikilishik?” she attempted. 

Harry shook his head. “Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk.” 

“What’sss going on?” 

“She knowsss- but I don’t think ssshe’s going to tell on usss. Be careful, though.” 

“Can you do other stuff, too?” she asked. “Like- moving things without touching them, and stuff? Any superpowers?”

Harry shrugged. “Maybe. Look, if you tell anyone-” 

“I won’t, I swear. I- I know it’s kinda weird, or probably not to you, but- ugh, just forget I said that- look, I really like snakes, okay? Oh god, I just realized I forgot to introduce myself, I’m Courtney, I’m going into Year Eleven.” Courtney smushed her cigarette. “Can I hold your snake?” 

“Um. I’m Harry Potter. Just- just a moment. ” Harry looked at her warily. “Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, ssshe wants to hold you.” 

“I don’t trussst her,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk said, eying Courtney warily.

“No, sorry,” Harry said, tensing just in case Courtney was angry. But Courtney just shrugged. 

“Whatever, not a big deal. I’ll see you around. If you ever want help thinking of a good superhero name, come at me, okay?” Courtney wandered off. 

Harry sat still for a long time. Courtney knew about Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, but she didn’t seem mad. She thought he could be a superhero, like in that movie their class had watched with their sub. 

Harry got lost in thought. If he was a superhero, he could save people, and then the people who he saved would like him. Maybe even Dudley had liked him- Dudley had liked the superhero in the movie. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon might like him, too, then. 

But talking to snakes wasn’t a very good power, was it? You couldn’t save anyone with that. Harry thought of what Courtney said. Were the freakish things that had happened around him- superpowers? Because of superpowers? Then why were the Dursleys angry when they happened? Was Harry a supervillain? Harry shuddered and put it out of his mind, heading home. 

A couple of days later, Harry went to the library. 

The nearby public library was a good place to hide from Dudley and his gang, as the librarian there hated how loud they were, and never allowed them to stay there very long. One of the books Harry read there was about a man named Sherlock Holmes. Harry didn’t almost any of it, but he had been so amazed at how Sherlock Holmes figured things out so quickly, using logic. Harry kept on wondering what Sherlock Holmes would think about Harry and the freakish things that happened around him, so Harry decided to go about this logically, and be his own Sherlock Holmes. 

He borrowed a pencil and paper from the library, and he sat down at a desk. He wrote down every strange thing that had ever happened around or to him- the way his hair grew back in one night when it was cut, the time he somehow found himself on the roof of his school, his teacher’s hair changing color after she insulted him. He wrote down everything he could remember about each incident, and read it over, once, twice, three or four times, looking for connections, patterns, explanations.

There wasn’t much. Only that- each time that something had happened, he had been upset- angry, or scared, or desperately in need of something. He wasn’t sure how these things happened, but he could tell that much. 

He didn’t think he had any control over it, really, so he didn’t think it could be superpowers. And anyway, superheroes were supposed to have, you know, interesting backstories, and Harry didn’t. He had dead parents, and a meaningless scar. 

The next best thing he could think of was some kind of- miracle. Like the reverend had talked about in church, that one time some of the neighbors had suggested the “power of God will cure your delinquent nephew”, and Aunt Petunia had dragged him along, her cheeks bunched up like she was sucking lemons. 

The thing about that was- well. There were two things, actually. Number one, Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon went to church- mostly to impress the neighbors, but still- so if it was some kind of miracle, wouldn’t they avoid punishing him for it, for fear of God? And also, well, there was no way there was someone- up there- who cared about Harry. No one down here did, so why would someone up there? 

Harry tried not to think about it all very much. He knew that wasn’t what Sherlock Holmes would do- Sherlock Holmes would poke and prod at it until he understood it- but Harry wasn’t sure he should. What if he really was a freak, not a superhero? 

Not that Harry had very much time to think about anything. Most of his time, he spent at school, or working on his chores, or hurrying to finish homework the Dursleys hadn’t allowed him any time for. When the Dursleys went to church- having now figured out an excuse to leave him at the house- he got two hours extra time, locked in his cupboard, that he usually spent sleeping, or occassionally reading, if he managed to filch one of Dudley’s books. 

Life for Harry wasn’t good, of course. It was hard and the days were long, but there were little pockets of nice time- working in the garden with Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk for company, going to sleep, learning something new in school, even if all the teacher hated him and he couldn’t reveal that he had any idea what they were talking about, that sort of thing. Life was bearable, and that was only as much as someone like Harry could hope for.


	2. companions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry gets his first real presents, and shows the traits that will get him into Slytherin.

Harry had expected that despite what Courtney had said, Harry wouldn’t actually run into Courtney again. But that summer, he did. He ran into Courtney at the park again- she was there first, and swinging slowly on the swings, and Harry assumed she wouldn’t want to talk, would have realized he was a freak, so Harry chose the farthest away bench, but Courtney leapt from the swing and came to talk. 

“Hey, kiddo,” She said. “Did- Seelis- Sseelishechishik come with you?” 

“Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk,” Harry corrected quietly. “But yeah.” Hearing her name, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk emerged from Harry’s oversized hoodie, slowly slithering out to eye Courtney. 

“I really do think it’s a superpower, you know,” Courtney said. “There’s- there’s no way for me, or anyone else but you, I guess, to pronounce that. Or- I don’t think so. That’s how I realized you were actually talking to her, because everyone else hisses differently. Yours sound- more accurately.” 

“Huh,” Harry said. “So- I’m actually- I’m actually hissing?” He asked hesitantly. 

“Yeah,” Courtney confirmed. “What, does it just seem like- English- to you?” 

“With a bit of an accent, but yeah,” Harry said, scratching Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk under her chin. “Ki-ki-ki-ki,” she laughed with pleasure. 

“Did you know,” Courtney said. “I- I like snakes, right? I told you? Well- that’s a garter snake. She’s a garter snake. I researched to identify her, and- and garter snakes communicate by scents, not really hisses.” 

Harry shrugged. “I- I don’t know,” He murmered, flinching away slightly from the curious look in her eyes. 

Courtney shrugged too, after a moment, puffing out smoke. “I’m not trying to bug you or anything, I’m sorry.” She glanced at Harry out of the side of her eye, and it looked like she might say something, her mouth partially open, but she shook her head. “Look, I’ll stop bugging you. I should go home soon anyway.” She started to leave. 

“I- I don’t mind talking with you,” Harry called after her quietly. “Just- just by the way.” 

Courtney turned her head, revealing a brilliant white-toothed smile. She shook her hand in a wave. “Bye, Harry!” 

As Harry walked home, he asked Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, “Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, what doesss my talking sssound like to you?” 

“Like ssscents and posssturing, made into sssounds, and even other thingsss that are not ssscents and posssturing, that I could not ssshow in ssscents, before,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk said slowly. 

Harry nodded. If Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon heard about this- they would hate it, call it freakiness. But Courtney knew, and she- she kind of liked it, didn’t she? 

A week or two later was Harry’s ninth birthday. Harry got his newest present from the Dursleys- a cheap coat hanger that was bent almost completely out of shape- two pieces of bread with peanut butter instead of one, for breakfast, did his chores, and then left for the park, without Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk this time, as she was busy hunting today. 

Harry told Courtney so when Courtney appeared, a lollipop stuck in her mouth for once, instead of a cigarette. 

“I’m trying to smoke less,” Courtney explained. “I read up some more on what it does- did you know people who hang out with smokers too much, get smoke in their lungs, themselves? I already knew it messes me up, but I couldn’t stand messing everyone else around me up, too.” 

“That makes sense,” Harry said after a moment. His hands wanted to find and pet Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk; he had gotten used to having her with him, when he went to the park. 

They sat quietly for a while, then Courtney said, “Penny for your thoughts?” 

“It’s my birthday,” Harry explained. “I’m just thinking about how it feels like I should feel older, but I don’t.” 

“Oh,” Courtney said, digging around in her pocket. After a moment, she handed him a 5p coin, and then a lolly. 

“What?” Harry asked, glancing at Courtney in confusion. 

“For your thoughts-” Courtney pointed at the 5p coin, “-and for your birthday. Sorry I didn’t have anything better, I didn’t know.” 

“For my birthday?” 

“Yeah. You know, between friends.” 

“Are you we friends?” Harry glanced up at her shyly through his lashes. 

“If you want,” Courtney said. 

“I’d like that,” Harry said, smiling up at her.

Harry was so happy about having a birthday present, that he walked home with the mostly-eaten lolly stuck in his mouth. When Aunt Petunia saw it, she assumed Harry had stolen it from her precious Duddikins. For a few days after that, Harry did chores from morning til night, with only the ocassional garden visit from Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk to keep him company. 

Harry saw Courtney a few more times that summer, but once school started, Harry didn’t see her nearly as much. Harry was very lonely that winter, as it turned out Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hibernated in the cold months. Courtney and Harry shared a whole package of cookies one day in the park near Christmas, and then Harry didn’t see her for nearly three months. 

As soon as school stopped, him and Courtney hung out more, often with Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, but sometimes without her. Courtney would tell Harry funny stories. Over time Harry started telling her stories too, telling her about how he turned a teacher’s hair blue, or that time he ended up on the roof somehow. At Courtney’s request, Harry tried to turn her hair blue, but it didn’t really work- though Courtney swore the tips looked the teensiest bit blue in some lights, now. 

Harry found that less weird stuff happened around him, now. Courtney theorized that he only had so much “magical energy” (her words, not his) and he used it up trying to do things with Courtney, so less “magic” happened spontaneously. 

Courtney gave him a birthday card and twenty pounds. Earlier, Harry had hidden his five p under a floorboard because he had never had money of his own. The sparkly birthday card and 20 pounds quickly joined them in the hiding place as some of Harry’s most precious objects. 

The Taylors ended up moving rather abruptly at the end of the summer. A family member died, Aunt Petunia gossiped, and he’d had some really very awful debts they would need to pay for him, so they couldn’t afford to live in an upper middle class neighborhood anymore. 

Courtney gave him a hug, the first one Harry remembered ever receiving, and a book called The Hobbit for a going away present. He snuck it into his cupboard and read it a very little at a time, sneaking paragraphs by the light of the dim bulb, squinting through his glasses, hiding it under the floorboard with his birthday card and money. 

It was nice having a book to read that was all his own property, but Harry missed Courtney horribly. Harry had never even known Courtney that well, but she had been nice to him, had given him presents. 

Any extra time Harry had, he devoted to school. Courtney had told him that she really regretted not doing better in school. Harry couldn’t tell her that he really couldn’t raise his grades much for fear of his family, but Courtney also mentioned that if you did well on A Levels, bad grades in school didn’t matter as much. Maybe if Harry was really smart, if he did well on A Levels, he could get into university on a scholarship, and stay far away from the Dursleys, he thought to himself.

It was hard finding time to study, though. There was breakfast to cook, and then Dudley’s lunch to pack, school, and then when he got home, Dudley’s after school meal to be cooked, the garden to water and trim/weed a little, and usually a few more chores Aunt Petunia assigned spontaneously. Sometimes Harry had to cook dinner, sometimes he didn’t. 

After his chores, Harry would go to his cupboard and try reading through his textbooks under the light of the dim bulb, but it was hard to concentrate, and by then he was usually, well, quite tired. 

During school lunch hour, he would go to the library to avoid Dudley’s fists. He would sometimes read textbooks, but mostly he preferred to read Lord of the Rings; it was pretty slow going, and it was a little boring at times, but Harry really loved it. 

Not much by way of freakishness had happened recently. Sometimes, in the library, the pages would turn of their own volition, but Dudley never went into the library, and the librarian didn’t seem to notice, so Harry figured he was safe, there. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk visited him whenever he was out watering the garden, but they couldn’t spend as much time together as they often did in the summer. 

Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk began to get sleepy, and finally went into hibernation, in her undisclosed hiding place in Mrs. Figg’s yard. 

Harry was cooking breakfast a few days before Christmas, when he dropped a china plate. He was staring at it in horror, dreading the scolding he would get, thinking of the meals he would miss, when the plate stopped about five centimeters off from the ground. He moved quickly to pick it up before anyone could see, but Aunt Petunia saw, and Harry got a day or two in the cupboard. Those two days happened to be Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, which Harry didn’t actually mind as much as he thought he would, because he didn’t have to see Dudley gloat over his new presents. 

Spring approached, and Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk came out of hibernation. The Dursleys, oddly enough, seemed to be getting tenser and tenser around him; Harry could see them eying him. Harry worried they were reaching a breaking point, and might dump him on the side of the road somewhere, so he started covertly carrying his small amount of money everywhere, in his shoe, just in case. 

Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk wanted Harry to carry her around everywhere, for protection against the Dursleys, but Harry thought that would just be dangerous for both of them, so Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk finally just gave it up and instead was reluctantly content with just hissing threats whenever Harry told her they’d done something particularly nasty. 

Everything came to a head on Dudley’s birthday. 

On Dudley’s birthday, he had ended up going to the zoo. It had all started off very well, Harry managing to get a cheap lemon ice pop and even half of Dudley’s rejected Knickerbocker Glory. Too well, in fact- he should have known it wouldn’t have lasted.

He had been subtly talking to the snake behind the glass, feeling rather bad for them, when suddenly, the glass wasn’t there. The snake uncoiled itself and slithered past, fake-biting playfully at several people’s heels. “Brazil, here I come… Thanksss, amigo.” 

Harry had been in the cupboard eight days, and it was three days since he had had anything to eat or drink, other than water. 

Everything was strange and dim, and seemed distant. The worst part, was, he basically was in the same situation as the snake now. Trapped in a little space, unable to get out. Unlike the snake, however, he was ignored, not watched. 

But the snake had gotten free. Could Harry use his “superpowers” to get out? Courtney had seemed to think he could do anything with them, if he tried hard enough… 

He should do it now, while they were fast asleep. 

Harry stared at the cupboard door, waiting, his heart pounding. He allowed his excitement to build, his desperate hope that this would work, his knowledge that he really needed to get something to eat- he allowed all of those things to rise in him. 

He stared at the cupboard door so hard his vision blurred, but he absolutely refused to let his eyes blink. “Please…” He said hoarsely, very quietly. “Please, I don’t know how this works, whoever you are, if it’s someone who’s doing this for me- please, I know I want it badly, I want to get out so very much, please superpowers-” 

There was a rattling, and Harry flinched a little in surprise, but he was already here in the cupboard. He was already in the cupboard, without food, locked in. He needed this. And anyway, he doubted anyone would actually wake up because of the little rattling noise; the Dursleys were all deep sleepers. 

Harry refocused, pulling in the desperation, the elation, the disbelief that this was working, and pushed it at the door. 

Again the rattling. Slowly, slowly, the cupboard door opened. 

Harry felt dizzy, much dizzier than before, perhaps with elation or just the effort of all that concentrating. Harry slipped his feet into his socks, so that he would be quiet on the floors, and walked, very slowly- he had all night, no need to rush and get himself caught- to the kitchen. 

Harry had no idea if he’d ever be able to make this work again. He had no idea if this was just some sort of fluke. He needed to get a good bit of food, enough that if he stayed in a whole week more- which was probably what would happen, based on the mood of the Dursleys of the moment, they were staying mad at him longer than usual- he would be able to still be strong afterwards. He also needed it to be something they wouldn’t notice gone. And, it had to be something that wouldn’t go bad; he couldn’t eat it all now, as he would throw up, his shrunken stomach unable to handle the food. 

Harry’s instinct was to try to get some canned food, but there was only one can opener; Aunt Petunia would definitely notice if Harry stole it. Harry’s only chance was to look in the freezer, then. 

Harry slowly, methodically began to look through it, making note of exactly where everything was as he silently took it out. He could feel stress rising in his throat- all of these things were relatively recent additions, things Aunt Petunia would easily notice gone. But, as he dug deeper, Harry found what he was looking for. 

Almost three quarters of a loaf of raisin bread, stuffed in the very back. Aunt Marge loved the stuff, but Dudley and Uncle Vernon hated the texture, and Aunt Petunia hated the extra sugar. No one would notice it gone. 

Harry replaced the rest of the food, and returned to the cupboard, clutching the frozen loaf of bread. It was only as he had just finished hiding the bread beneath one of the floorboards, and was moving to close the cupboard door, when he realised there was a flaw in his almost-perfect plan. 

The cupboard locked from the outside, and only from the outside. 

Harry felt his heart pound hard in his chest as he slowly sat down on his cot. He was going to get caught now. They would be so mad- but wait. What if he could make it close? 

Harry was quite tired by now, but he managed to pull into his stress, and he wished and wished, and it finally locked itself, after five or six tries.

Harry promptly fell asleep, exhausted, and even slept almost all of the next day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter spans a much longer period of time, and because of this, it's a little bit choppy. I was considering try to beef it up, and showing, not telling, more, but I feel like for this less interesting bit of backstory, it makes more sense to just skim over it. In the future, as we get deeper into the story, I'll focus in more on specific events more, don't worry. 
> 
> Garter snakes actually do communicate by pheromones. Because not all snakes actually hiss, I have a theory that Parseltongue is a language that snakes intuitively understand, but don't use among themselves. I also have a theory that speaking Parseltongue with humans makes snake more intelligent, which is why Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk shows a near-human level of intelligence. 
> 
> I have a lot of headcanons, okay? 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Feel free to comment and tell me what you think! :)


	3. of witchcraft and wizardry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A series of letters in emerald green ink arrive. Harry meets Hagrid, and what appears to be a pointier wizard version of Dudley.

Harry wrinkled his nose at the smell of his new uniform as he entered the kitchen. If he looked and smelt like that on the first day, he would get jumped upon and beaten to a pulp before his first class, even if a couple of people were similar to Courtney. Maybe he should bring Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk to school; it might impress the nice ones, and scare off the others. Then again, Aunt Petunia was paying him a good bit more attention lately, like she was… suspicious. 

He would have to prove that he was cool, that he was worthy, in some way. But how? All the popular kids in primary had either been bullies, or the sorts of well-dressed people who got decent grades but also had nice laughs, and told good jokes. Harry wasn’t a good fighter; he’d never even thrown a punch- and he also wasn’t well-dressed, or allowed to get good grades. 

Dudley poked at him with his Smelting stick. “Listen to Dad.” Harry’s hand shot out and caught the Smelting stick’s end in the split second before it could jab him in the ribs. 

“What?” He asked, glancing at Uncle Vernon, keeping his gaze below his uncle’s eyes. “I didn’t hear what you said.” 

“Go get the mail, boy.” 

Harry got up and wandered down the hall, picking up the mail. He shuffled through it quickly. Bill, postcard, and- a- a letter for him?

Mr. H. Potter, the Cupboard under the Stairs. So, it was for him, not an accident- and, whoever this was, they knew where he slept. A little tremor ran through Harry’s fingers. Uncle Vernon would be so angry if someone complained- but if they knew, how long? They mustn’t have told anyone yet- so it was someone who had known, and didn’t care. That just left Aunt Marge, and the Dursleys themselves. A joke? No… wasn’t their style.

It was strange, and too big to think about now, so, well, he’d have to think about it later. He slipped the letter under the door of the cupboard, resolving to read it as soon as breakfast was over.

But Aunt Petunia poured on loads and loads of chores- clean the bathrooms, wash the sinks, scrub the floors he had just cleaned yesterday. Stranger still, instead of ignoring him as usual, she lingered close, awkwardly pretending to straighten things here and there as she watched him, before finally leaving- and then, five minutes later, she would poke her long neck in through the door frame. Finally, she assigned him to work in the garden, and Harry left gratefully, glad to get a bit farther away, wondering all the while if Aunt Petunia did have something to do with the letter after all. As he did his yard work, he talked to Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, who had to be careful to sit just so, so that Aunt Petunia didn’t see her. 

“Perhapsss,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk said rather slowly and thoughtfully, “it has something to do with the ssstrange things that happen around you.” 

“What about Aunt Petunia?” Harry asked, turning so Aunt Petunia couldn’t see his mouth moving. “How would she know about it?” 

Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed a snake word equivalent to a human shrug. “Humansss are ssstrange, especially the mousy vermin you live with. The only I come anywhere near underssstanding is you.” 

“I sssuppose I’ll have to wait until I sssee the letter,” Harry said, blushing with pleasure at Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk’s compliment. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed back, and playfully fake-bit his hand. Harry ran his hand over her scales affectionately, and Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk left to go catch something to eat. 

When he finally finished his chores, Aunt Petunia stopped him from going to the cupboard. “The lock is broken, it’s stuck in the locked position.” She said, the tense little twitch in her fingers and cheeks informing him, clear as day, that she was lying. “You’ll be sleeping in Dudley’s second bedroom until we fix it.”

Harry nodded, resolving to sneak down and get the letter as soon as the Dursleys fell asleep, but, exhausted by the work, he couldn’t stay up. 

The next day, Harry tumbled down stairs and started fixing some bacon, thinking longingly of the letter in the cupboard all the while. As the Dursleys ate quietly and Harry nibbled at the scraps he had been allowed, he wondered again at how whoever they were knew about the cupboard. If they knew… if it was something to do with the strange happenings, perhaps… he had kind of suspected his parents might had been, well, like him, because, well, genetics. Perhaps it was an old friend of his parents, finally remembering him? Well, if they knew about the cupboard, and they were a family friend, why hadn’t they come before? Harry’s knuckles turned white as he gripped the table. He was kind of- unhappy they hadn’t taken him away from here, treated him a little bit like Dudley got treated- like he was worth something. Maybe that was too much to hope for. 

“Da-aa-aad!” Dudley called, sounding upset. “Harry got a letter!” 

Had Dudley somehow found the letter? Harry glanced up, face a study on innocent surprise, and vague interest.

Uncle Vernon’s normally pink face paled dramatically, and Aunt Petunia flinched back, back stiff as a board, looking like she might faint.

“Vernon, check,” she said at last, shaking herself. “It might not-” 

“Hand it over, Dudley,” Uncle Vernon said gruffly. 

“I found it myself! I want to read it!” Dudley said loudly, but Uncle Vernon took it, breaking the purple seal and pulling the letter out. Upon unfolding it, he went purple, then red, then white again. Harry almost wanted to laugh, except that he was sure that whatever was going on, it was going to end up with him in the cupboard again, or perhaps out doing seven or eight hours of gardening without any water. 

“P-P-Petunia, it’s-” He handed it over. 

Aunt Petunia made a choking noise. “It is,” She whispered hoarsely. “It is.” 

“I want to read the letter,” Dudley repeated again, sounding very annoyed now.

“Get out, both of you.” 

Harry started off, telling himself sternly he should wait until that night to see about the letter in the cupboard instead of running off now, but Dudley lingered, arguing, until Uncle Vernon threw him out by the scruff of his neck and slammed the door shut behind them.

Dudley shoved Harry aside from the keyhole, but Harry hadn’t even been bothering to go for it; he was lost in thought, wringing his hands. This was all sure to end badly for him, because that’s how it always did, that’s how things always were for him. 

Uncle Vernon raised his voice. “I’m not having one in the house in the house, Petunia! Didn’t we swear when we took him in we’d stamp out all that dangerous nonsense?” 

So it was about the strange things that Harry caused to happen after all. 

That night, he stayed up in Dudley’s second room, watching the Mickey Mouse themed clock Dudley had gotten for his seventh birthday. When he was sure the Dursleys were asleep, he rolled out of bed, shivering at the cold air. He could hear his teeth chattering, so he shuffled around and grabbed a forgotten beanie, then slipped down the stairs, easily avoiding the creaky steps, and reached the cupboard. 

It was locked, of course; that was part of Aunt Petunia’s cover story. 

Harry chewed the inside of his lip. He could try to find the key, but that would probably take a while; he had no idea where it was. The other option would be try to do like he had done after the vanishing glass incident; but there was the danger he wouldn’t be able to make it lock up again, after he’d unlocked it. Harry had only managed to make things happen on purpose twice; and he’d had to try a lot of times, and work very hard, for the second time to work, because he had been tired from the first. 

If they discovered what he was doing, it would be… the punishment would be much more, much worse than that for the snake-and-glass incident, Harry thought. 

But they would never give him the letter; Harry would have to retrieve it himself. And- these people might know his parents, they might have something to do with the strange things that happened around him. But- the chance was small. And- whoever had written the letter had already known about the cupboard, so that meant they must be willing to overlook it- they might have their own unwanted relatives, tucked into cupboards or stuck outside in the heat, doing hours of chores. 

It wasn’t worth the risk. Slowly, Harry mounted the stairs, and went back to bed, tasting thick bitterness on his tongue. His hands shook as they balled into fists. So, he would wait another ten years or so. So, he would go to Stonewall. He would try to find someone there who might be able to, if not love him, but at least endure him. And if there was no one who could love him, Harry would find a way to make them fear him, instead. Anything to survive. 

The letters kept coming, but Harry couldn’t get his hands on any more letters, and his covert looking about for the key wasn’t any good. After a day of letters piling up, Uncle Vernon nailed up the mail slot, and then when more letters came, the cracks around the doors. Uncle Vernon burnt them and ripped them and the letters that had came curled up in the two dozen unbroken eggshells were put through the food processor. Harry watched it all rather morosely, wishing he’d just kept the original letter on him, instead of tucking it into the cupboard.

It was on Sunday that Uncle Vernon finally cracked. The idea that letters could be delivered on Sunday really was just too much of a change to the Dursleys’ perfect, normal world to be handled. Uncle Vernon pulled out half his ugly mustache and ordered them to pack up to leave. Harry grabbed The Hobbit and rolled it up in a hoodie so no one would find it, stuffed his 20 pounds and 5p savings into his shoe, and then tucked his hair into his “new” beanie. Aunt Petunia had noticed, but hadn’t said anything, probably because it covered his hated hair, and it was too small for Dudley anyway. 

Railview Hotel was ugly, and smelt of mold. It rained long and loud; Harry sat on the windowsill and stared out into the wet street below. He thought he heard the low rumble of thunder in the distance. His thoughts turned to Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk and he wondered how many letters from whoever-it-was there would be waiting for him the next morning. 

The accommodations actually got worse. 

Harry shivered in his oversized, ratty sweater, pulling his beanie down further. Salty sea spray flew into the boat. He could see Aunt Petunia’s lips curl, but Uncle Vernon was long past reason, so she just shook her horsey head and held Dudley close.

The house- no, not a house, more like a mere shack- seemed like it would come down with just one more good gust of wind. The sound of it whistling through the cracks in the wooden walls sounded a little like the scream from Harry’s green-lights nightmare. 

Dudley stole most of Harry’s food, leaving only half of the banana. Uncle Vernon chortled and congratulated Dudley on wanting what he was due, and Harry could see Aunt Petunia relaxing slightly, seeing a bit of the Uncle Vernon they were used to.

Uncle Vernon couldn’t get a fire to start up, and so at last they all went to bed. Harry looked around for the softest bit of floor, at last just settling down right in the center of the room, but not bothering to lie down. He wouldn’t be able to sleep with the wind like that. His thoughts turned to the vague green-lights nightmare; there was the scream, not of pain but of terror, cut off abruptly as green light exploded; and then the second explosion of green light, the one that always filled his vision, and woke him up. It always brought with it a sense of loss, and melancholy; Harry shook it off as he glanced at Dudley’s watch, straining around his fat wrist. 

It was five minutes to his birthday. Slowly, Harry reached out of his little ragged blanket cocoon and drew himself a birthday cake in the thick dust. 

“Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday dear Harry, Happy Birthday to me…” His eyes teared up, because he wished so very badly that someone else was here, someone who liked him, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk or Courtney perhaps, who would comfort him from green lights and howling winds and being alone. Five seconds to his birthday. 

Four… three… two… one…

He blew out the dust cake. 

BOOM!

The whole shack gave a great shake like there was some kind of earthquake. Dudley sat up, suddenly wide awake, and in rushed Uncle Vernon, carrying a rifle.

SMASH!

Through where there had been a door, stood a giant. 

Five minutes later, Harry was savoring his first real birthday cake ever, the letter in his hand. 

He slowly turned it over, savoring the moment as he inspected the wax. A lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake with a big H in the center. Harry smiled a little at the snake, then shook himself and broke the seal. 

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, he read. 

Harry glanced out of the corner of his eye at the giant. The gi- Hagrid’s face showed excitement, and disapproval and dislike when his eyes happened to land on the Dursleys. Either Hagrid was quite good at bluffing, or he didn’t know about how bad Harry’s situation was. Or he just genuinely didn’t care that much. 

But... this Headmaster, or this Deputy Headmistress, or someone, whoever had written the letter, knew exactly where he had been. They had known at least some about the treatment… So probably if he went there, it would be about like here, if they approved of the Dursleys’ methods, they probably employed the same ones… but… 

But. It was this or Stonewall, and he knew in his gut he would make no friends at Stonewall, only even more enemies. And this was magic.

Yes, he wasn’t foolish enough to think they wouldn’t hate him at… Hogwarts… too. Him, who grew up with people who knew nothing about wizards or witches. And someone there had decided to keep him in the cupboard.

But. Maybe there were other people. Maybe the Headmaster, if it was the Headmaster who had done this to Harry, had enemies who… who he might be able to offer something to, in return for protection, though he had no idea what he did have to offer. Or maybe… there might even be the very rare, genuinely nice people. People like the Bilbo Baggins's of real life, people like Courtney and the public and school library librarians who always protected him from Dudley. 

So Harry smiled innocently up at Hagrid, and asked for more information. 

The giant- Hagrid, Keeper of the Keys and Grounds of Hogwarts- said he knew his parents, and he seemed- nice, if a little bit lacking in the way of intellect. 

The cake was very good, and not poisoned or filled with salt instead of sugar. Following it (rather than before) Hagrid gave him the biggest meal he’d ever had, and Hagrid overall seemed a rather useful, if loud, source of information. 

Also, he was apparently he was some kind of morbid celebrity- a war hero who had somehow defeated this… dark wizard. 

Harry stared at Hagrid for a while, waiting for him to say “just kidding!” But he didn’t, so eventually Harry began to ask some questions. 

They were just getting to Albus Dumbledore, as Harry was trying to feel out if that was the guy who had done this to him, when-

“I AM NOT PAYING SOME CRACKPOT OLD FOOL TO TEACH HIM MAGIC TRICKS!” yelled Uncle Vernon. 

“NEVER- INSULT- ALBUS- DUMBLEDORE- IN- FRONT- OF- ME!” 

Harry winced back, sure Hagrid was going to hit Uncle Vernon, but he turned to Dudley instead, and just like that, with a little flash of light, Dudley had a pig’s tail. 

Hagrid didn’t seem to like the Dursleys at all, even if he seemed to be loyal to this slightly suspicious Dumbledore guy. And the cake… that had been really nice. Harry decided he liked, and trusted, Hagrid… at least enough not to force himself enough to stay up all night making sure Hagrid wouldn’t do anything to him. 

Still, Harry couldn’t fall asleep until he heard Hagrid’s even, loud, snores.

He woke up and discovered with great joy that it hadn’t all been a dream. Maybe there was that shady Dumbledore fellow to deal with, but he had, for maybe the third time in his life, an adult who he was actually willing to look up to. The librarians, Courtney, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, and now Hagrid… life was almost going soft on him now, with all these rare, nice people. 

Diagon Alley was just as crazy and magical looking as you could ever imagine a magical shopping center might be, and even more so. After the little incident in the Leaky Cauldron, he pulled his beanie down low over his scar, and asked Hagrid not to tell people who he was. 

The entire thing was a dizzying, kind of nausea-inducing rush, rather like the ride down through Gringotts- because apparently he was rich. The entire thing- rich, a celebrity- felt… like the thing with the zoo, too good to be true, and every time Hagrid smiled at him there was a nasty feeling in his stomach, of excitement, delight, bubbling up, mixing with dread he couldn’t have explained to anyone who hadn’t grown up a freak in the Dursley household. Good things happening to Harry- they meant days in the cupboard, later.

It was kind of a relief when Hagrid left to go get a drink. Harry stepped up onto a stool, glad to be able to stand still instead of trotting to keep up with Hagrid, and let Madam Malkin start measuring him up. 

“Hello,” the boy next to him began, “Hogwarts, too?” 

Harry glanced over. The boy looked slim in a way that was aristocratic not nutrition deprived, but still too slim to pack much of a punch. Most interestingly of all, he was voluntarily talking to Harry- then again, Harry supposed, he hadn’t been influenced by Dudley into hating him, like all of Harry’s classmates had. 

The pointy blonde was starting to frown and look at him rather haughtily, with his nose in the air, so Harry schooled his face into something a little holier-than-thou, answering at last, “Yes.” 

Harry had seen, too late, from the other kids in his class, that sometimes the best way to deal with a bully was to pretend you were a bit of one yourself. 

The trick, Harry decided, would be to not think of himself as the skinny potter boy kind of Harry he was, but a Harry who was calm and cool and collected and loved, who could get away with stuff just like Dudley could. 

The boy’s face relaxed slightly, and he began to drawl something about books and wands. This boy, Harry figued, was essentially a pointy, paler Dudley. “Have you got your own broom?” 

“Yes.” Usually Aunt Petunia had him use a vacuum cleaner, or chemicals that made his eyes burn, but they did have one old broom for sweeping floors. Not the kind the boy was thinking of, Harry assumed. The whole thing kind of amused Harry, and loose and comfortable without Dudley or the Dursleys to worry about, he let a smirk show. The other boy mirrored it easily. 

“Do you play Quidditch?” The other boy asked with interest. “What position?” 

“No,” Harry said easily, pulling his beanie down a little lower in a casual move. This conversation was awkward enough already. “What about you?” 

“I do- Seeker. Father says it’s a crime if I’m not picked to play for my house, and I must say, I agree. Know what house you’ll be in yet?” 

“What were the houses again?” Harry asked.

“What are the houses?” The pointy boy gave him an odd look. “Are your parents… our type?” His nose moved like he had smelt something a bit nasty, but was too polite to say anything.

“Yes, they were magical, if that’s what you’re asking,” Harry said, voice flat, face neutral. 

“I really don’t think they should let the other sort in, do you? They’re just not the same, they’ve never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families.”

“Mm,” Harry said, keeping the annoyance from his voice. This reminded him of Dudley parroting Uncle Vernon’s views on immigration, all while looking very pointedly at him- even though Harry had lived in England all his life, and so his stupid views shouldn’t even apply. “Like I said, my parents were magical.” 

“Were?”

“They’re dead,” Harry said shortly.

“Oh, sorry.” The pointy Dudley didn’t sound very sorry, but he did allow a pause before returning to interrogating him. “So you- you did grow up around here, then?” 

“I’m new to Wizarding Britain. It seems kind of small- don’t you think you would have probably run into me or something by now if I had grown up here?” 

The pointy boy gave him a look. “And Wizarding India is bigger?” 

Harry smiled with just one corner of his mouth, so it didn’t make him a liar, but Mr. Pointy would have to be actually Dudley to think it a no. The pointy boy grinned back. 

A moment or two later, he went back to the stream of chatter, sounding quite smug. “Well, the houses are Slytherin, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Gryffindor. Slytherin’s the house I’ll be going to- that’s for the people who really want something in life, you understand. They’re the people who reach positions of power, who do things with their life. Ravenclaw’s the smart people- they’re super curious, love knowledge. Some of them can be a little bit weird, but next to Slytherin, it’s the best. Hufflepuff, well- I think I’d leave, if I ended up in Hufflepuff, not that I ever would be a Hufflepuff. They’re obsessed with being nice, being loyal, working hard. They’re just soft. Now, Gryffindors are the worst. They’re absolute reckless idiots, obsessed with being brave- got these ideals they say that they stick to quite tightly, but they’re actually real hypocrites, and they’ve got the wrong ideals in the first place anyway.” 

“Say- what House is the Headmaster in?”

“Albus Dumbledore?” 

“Ridiculous name,” Harry muttered before he could stop himself.

Pointy boy laughed. “I quite agree. He’s in Gryffindor- and very biased, he gives them points for just about everything. Of course, this makes the rest of the houses rather annoyed, especially Slytherin. Gryffindors tend to not be very popular.” He flashed a smile at Harry winningly. “But I don’t think that will be a problem for you, will it?” 

Harry had to agree. He wasn’t going into any house that contained a man who might have let him stay in the cupboard. Slytherin didn’t sound too bad, either, but in all honesty, Hufflepuff sounded the best to him- he didn’t particularly want to be in any house with Pointy. If there were any people who would be able to overlook his morbid celebrity and everything to truly like him, it would probably the Hufflepuffs, from what Pointy said. He thought he could make friends in Hufflepuff. 

“Say, what’s your name?” Pointy boy started, his eyes widening slightly as he examined Harry better. “You know, it’s rather odd, you look quite similar to the pictures of James Potter that I’ve-” 

“That’s you done, my dear,” Madam Malkin said, and Harry hopped down, not bothering to answer the pointy boy. 

“Hey! Potter!” 

Harry spun around suddenly, panting slightly and cursing himself for revealing the truth. He eyed the pointy boy for a moment, then turned on his heel, pulling himself together and hoping no one else had heard. “See you at Hogwarts… I suppose,” Harry called lightly over one shoulder as he left, his hands shaking where he hid them in his sleeves. 

What a prick. Talking about how they shouldn’t let in people who weren’t from all magical families. He was right about one thing, though. Harry didn’t think he’d be in Gryffindor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “You won’t believe who I met at the robe shop,” Draco said smugly, looking up at his father. 
> 
> Lucius’ cane clicked on the uneven stones of Diagon Alley. A young witch wearing shabby robes layered over a muggle band t shirt and a pair of jeans hurried past, almost bumping into him, and his lip curled back. She cringed, ducking away with a hurried string of murmured apologies. 
> 
> “Who, darling?” Narcissa asked, taking Draco’s hand and giving it a little squeeze with her own slim, long fingers. 
> 
> “Harry Potter,” Draco said with satisfaction, and grinned as his father quickly turned to regard him, thinly veiled surprise apparent on his aristocratic face. “Apparently, he’s been off in Wizarding India. He was wearing a Slytherin green cap to hide his scar, and frankly, I agree with his choice in hat." Pausing to savor the words, he finished thoughtfully, "I do believe he’ll be in Slytherin, with me.”
> 
> “Very good, Draco,” Lucius said, and Draco’s grin widened even further.


	4. fluency

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry finds his way onto the train. He meets some interesting people.

The last month with the Dursleys was… tense. Harry didn’t go anywhere without his meager savings tucked into his shoe; he really wished he’d thought to convert some galleons into more muggle money. They mostly ignored him- even Uncle Vernon didn’t dare look at him longer than a second or too, but Harry could sense their underlying rage.

Still, Harry quite enjoyed his new freedom- he still cooked, not wanting to push things too far, but he got full meals for the first time. He spent a lot of time reading his new books- outside, so that when showed up, he was there to talk.

Secretly, Harry had been wondering if Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk would be willing to come with him to Hogwarts, too. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk had been spending more and more time with Harry, sometimes spending a day or two with him straight, and she had even expressed worry at the prospect of Harry going to Hogwarts alone, especially with the suspicious Dumbledore in charge. 

However, he knew Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk loved her home, and didn’t really like him enough to leave it and still be happy. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk seemed sad that Harry would be leaving, and spent a lot time cuddling, but he couldn’t expect her to leave her home for a human. 

Because of this, it was her that ended up suggesting it.

“When do we leave?” 

“What? We?”

“Sssilly human, I’m coming with you.” 

Harry almost cried. 

At the platform, he was grateful to have her in his sleeve, hissing customary promises of venom pumping through the Dursleys’ veins. 

“-packed with Muggles, of course-”

Harry spun, heart hammering, and spotted a huddle of redheads talking loudly- and they had an owl. 

“Now, what’s the platform number?” The mother asked, using the sort of, now-boys-and-girls-I-hope-you-know-this-by-now voice one of Harry’s more annoying teachers had always used.

Harry watched several of the children go through, but he still couldn’t figure it out, so after a moment he sighed and walked up. “Um, excuse me,” Harry said. 

At last, with the kind redheaded woman’s help, he found his way onto the platform, and then onto the train. Harry hurried into the first empty compartment he could find, very glad he was wearing his beanie. 

He gently lowered his sleeve so that Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk could slip out and sunbathe in the light from the window, then tried to heave his trunk up into the trunk holder at the top of the compartment, but didn’t quite make it. Finally he just left it on the floor. 

He curled up, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk on his shoulders, back to the window so he could watch the door, and began to reread The Hobbit, absently petting Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk as he did so, but he kept getting distracted. He found himself thinking of how hobbits sounded a little like Hufflepuff had been described as, and how he so hoped to be sorted there, for none of the hobbits in the book were anything like the Dursleys. Harry would much rather be safe and happy- surviving, perhaps, even, if he was lucky, thriving.

The Gryffindors, he thought, must be kind of like the dwarves- well meaning, because Hagrid had said no Gryffindor was ever purposefully nasty, but that still left room for being rather arrogant, reckless, and insensitive. 

Perhaps Elrond and the elves of Rivendell were the Ravenclaws? But who would be the Slytherins? And- would Harry be a Slytherin, himself? Pointy boy seemed to have been hinting at it, in a complimentary sort of way, but Harry didn’t think he wanted to be in Slytherin.

He didn’t think he wanted to be a Gryffindor, either, though even with Hagrid seeming to be trying to pressure him towards it with talk of his parents being Gryffindors themselves. Albus Dumbledore was a Gryffindor, and he wanted nothing to do with Dumbledore- and, for that matter, nothing to do with Professor Minerva McGonagall. If they had both signed off on the letter like that, then it wasn’t just Dumbledore who had known, but also Professor McGonagall who had known and done absolutely nothing. 

There was a knock at the door, and Harry flinched away in surprise. “It’sss okay, he’sss not a threat,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed. 

“Thanksss. Come in,” Harry called, heart still pounding. 

“Hey, I, um, I was wondering if I could sit here?” The youngest redhead asked, but then flinched back when he saw Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk wrapped loosely around Harry’s shoulders. “Ah- sorry- oops-” He fled, blushing brilliantly and leaving the door wide open. 

Harry was about to get up and close the door, when a pair of identical twins wandered in. 

“Could we sit here?” asked the twin with a pink butterfly clip at the end of her neat, oiled-back braid. 

“Sure,” Harry said, glancing at Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk a little nervously. 

“Oh, we don’t mind snakes,” the other twin, this one with slightly darker skin and a purple clip at the end of her hair. 

“We’re Parvati and Padma Patil,” The pink butterfly clip twin said. “I’m Parvati, she’s Padma. Could we please sit here?” 

“Um. I already said sure,” Harry mumbled, scratching Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk’s scales to soothe his nerves. 

“Who’re you?” Parvati said after a moment, and Harry felt his face grow hot as he realized he’d never introduced himself. 

“I’m Harry, uh, Harry Potter,” Harry said, fiddling with his beanie. 

“Can we see-” Parvati started, but Padma poked her in the ribs with an elbow. 

“It’s okay,” Harry said, slipping his beanie off and running a hand through his messy hair nervously. 

The twins just stared at it for a moment, and then first Padma, then Parvati, shook themselves and looked away, both blushing a little. Harry pulled his green beanie back on. 

“What house do you think you’ll be in?” Parvati asked. “I’m fairly sure I’ll end up in Gryffindor, myself. I’d love to live in Gryffindor Tower- and I heard Dumbledore himself was in Gryffindor! My parents didn’t go to Hogwarts, but I honestly think that if they had gone, my dad would probably be in Gryffindor! I think my parents are hoping for Ravenclaw or Slytherin, though,” She added, pouting and touching her pink butterfly clip. 

She seemed to have run out of things to say, so Harry waited a beat, then said, “I’m hoping for Hufflepuff.” 

“Hufflepuff? Really?” She leaned forward, closer than Harry was okay with, and Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed a little warningly. “Oh, um- sssorry, sss-sssir,” Parvati said. 

“You- you can talk to snakes?” Harry asked. He stared at her in awe. At the magical animal shop they went to, there had been snakes- but none of the adult wizards and witches had spoken to them, so Harry had assumed there was something off with him. 

Parvati blushed. “Um- we both can. Just a little. Parseltongue can be really useful in, like, wards and wardbreaking and stuff in the kind of magic used in India, and our uncle taught himself a whole lot, so he’s like near-fluent. He tried to teach us, but it’s like, really hard. Padma’s better at it. I know Britons think it’s kind of weird or creepy… but it’s really not,” she added bravely. 

“I don’t think so,” Harry murmured, scratching Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk under the chin. “That’s actually really cool, I didn’t know it had any practical uses other than, you know, talking to snakes.” 

“Can ssshe ssspeak?” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk asked.

Parvati made a mangled hissing noise, then blushed. “I totally messed that up.”

“I think ssshe can ssspeak a little bit. It’sss not inssstinctive like it isss for me, though,” Harry replied. 

“You can-” Parvati started, staring. 

“Yeah,” Harry said with a shrug. “I met Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk a few years ago, when I was about eight, and we’ve been really close ever since. I’m so grateful she agreed to come to Hogwarts with me.” 

Hearing her name, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk lifted her head from Harry’s shoulder. 

“Hi, Ssslshchhshkhelshehhk,” Padma hissed. 

“Close,” Harry said. “It’s Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, no “eh” sound.” 

“Oh.” 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to be bossy,” Harry said, blushing. 

“No, it’s fine, it’s cool th-”

Just then a bushy haired girl came in, with a slightly plump looking boy right behind him. “Have you seen a toad? Neville’s lost his, his name is Trevor.” she asked. 

“No, sorry,” Parvati said. 

“You could ask one of the upper years to summon it for you,” Padma suggested. 

“That’s a good idea,” the girl said, beaming. “I’m Hermione Granger, by the way. What’re your names?” She stepped in, Neville reluctantly following behind. Just then, someone else followed them in as well- pointy boy from Diagon Alley. 

“Well, is it true?” he said. “I was right, wasn’t I? You are Harry Potter.” 

“Yes,” Harry said shortly, looking at the thickset, Dudley-like guys standing like bodyguards next to him. “And who are you?”

“Oh, this is Crabbe, and this is Goyle. And my name’s Malfoy,” He paused as if savoring a positive reaction, but there wasn’t one. Longbottom looked unsurprised and unimpressed, Padma and Parvati’s faces didn’t even shift, and Granger actually bent over laughing. 

 

“Malfoy?” she chortled. “You mean to say your name is literally bad faith?” 

“Draco Malfoy,” He finished over her laughter, then turned to glare at her. “Je suis surpris que quelqu'un soulevé par la boue puisse comprendre même un soupçon de français. Mais vous ne savez pas ce que je dis, n'est-ce pas?”

“Boue? Vous êtes celui qui a le nom ‘mauvaise foi’. J'espère que la surprise vous donnera une crise cardiaque.” She pursed her lips at him, shaking her bushy head. 

Malfoy glared, but seemed to back down slightly. Neville looked at Hermione in shocked admiration, and Parvati grinned. 

“Anyway,” Malfoy said firmly with a sniff. “Potter. You do know riff raff like this girl is destined for Gryffindor? You’ll be in Slytherin, you know, with me, and not everybody can come with you. You’ll soon find out that some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don’t want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there.” 

“I suppose,” Harry said slowly, “That you’re talking about people who didn’t know about magic until their letter?” 

Hermione blushed uncomfortably and twisted her hands in skirt, but Parvati gave her an encouraging smile, and patted the seat next to her. Hermione sat down, smiling gratefully. “Don’t listen to that jerk,” Harry heard Parvati beginning to murmer, “he’s always been a real idiot.” 

“It’s because of like I said earlier,” Malfoy said. “They don’t understand wizarding culture.” He glanced at Hermione dismissively. “Je peux le voir sur votre visage. Même vous savez que c'est vrai.”

“N-non,” Hermione insisted, shaking her head and glaring at him fiercely. 

Harry sucked in a big breath, and then said, rather quietly, “In that case, you had better hurry and stop associating with me. Riff-raff might rub off- and anyway, I don’t think I’ll be joining you in Slytherin.” 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Malfoy asked, face pinking slightly. 

“I mean,” Harry said a little louder, giving Hermione a shy smile, “I’m a lot like Hermione, except I don’t speak French. Go scurry along and find someone else who cares.” 

“You said you grew up in Wizarding India!” Malfoy snarled.

“Nope. You thought I did, and I didn’t bother to correct you because, frankly, I hoped I’d never see your face again.” Harry sat down, mostly because his legs were shaking and he was wondering if the skinny Malfoy would be able to throw a decent punch after all.

But Malfoy stormed off without doing anything else, his bodyguards trailing behind. 

“That was so cool,” Neville said, turning bright eyes upon Harry. “He’s always been a big bully.” 

“Yeah!” Parvati exclaimed. “Honestly, what an arsehole!” 

“Parvati!” Padma said, sounding more fond than annoyed. 

“He is!” She stuck her tongue out at Padma. 

“Does Malfoy really mean bad faith?” Harry asked. 

“It does,” Hermione said with a light flush of pleasure. “I mean, the proper way to say it is mauvaise foi, not mal foi, but yeah. Are you really Harry Potter? I’ve read absolutely all about you, you’re in Modern Magical History, and The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts, and Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century.” 

“Am I?” 

“Goodness, didn’t you know, I’d have found out everything I could if it was me. Do either of you know what house you’ll be in? I’ve been asking around, and I hope I’m in Gryffindor, it sounds by far the best; I heard Dumbledore himself was in it, but I suppose Ravenclaw wouldn’t be too bad… I still just can’t believe you didn’t read up on yourself.” 

“Maybe not everyone’s as bookish as you,” Parvati said lightly to Hermione. 

Flushing slightly, Hermione went quiet.

“Malfoy really is a jerk, though,” Parvati said, looking like she regretted her somewhat harsh words. “If he bothers you, just tell me and Padma. Same for you, Longbottom, Potter. What houses do you guys think you’ll be in?” 

The conversation proceeded swimmingly from there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I take Spanish, not French, so that French is courtesy of the internet and may very well be a trash fire. If anyone speaks French, please feel free to correct it!
> 
> I won't be bashing Ron, or Dumbledore, or anyone except for maybe Umbridge, but I imagine Ron would probably be rather, ah, snake-averse, and currently Harry has some misconceptions about Dumbledore. 
> 
> Thank you for reading, and please feel free to comment! Even short comments or comments with critique makes me much more inspired!


	5. divisions and bridges

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry is sorted, and settles in a little.

“-you can even get stones that heat themselves up, snakes really love that kind of thing,” Parvati suggested. 

“Yeah, that sounds great,” Harry said, petting Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk. “Can I borrow your catalogue when I get to school?” 

“Well, I don’t have one on me, but I can ask my uncle to send you one,” Parvati said. “It’s an Indian company, but I can translate the catalogue for you, and they’re much better quality than British stuff, no Britons really pay much attention to snakes, it seems like…” 

“They do have kind of a bad rep,” Neville agreed. “So do toads.” 

“They have stuff for toads, too, you know,” Parvati added, turning to Neville. “I bet you wouldn’t lose Trevor so often if Trevor had a nice, comfy, wet home.”

“It’s probably much healthier for Trevor,” Hermione agreed. 

“We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes’ time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken to the school separately.” 

Harry’s stomach lurched with nerves and Neville, he saw, looked quite pale. When he glanced over at Hermione he saw that she looked like she might keel over. She was wringing her hands out, muttering quotes from various books under her breath rapidly. Parvati was growing flushed with excitement and only Padma seemed fully calm. 

The train slowed down and finally stopped. The group allowed the crowd to carry them to the boats. Hermione, and Neville ended up in one boat, and Harry (Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hidden in his robes) and the twins in another.

“Everyone in? Right then- FORWARD!” 

The lake below was as dark as the sky above, but made up of swirled, melted greens and blues where the sky was the brilliant smoky purples and pinks of a gorgeous sunset. The air, chilly but not too cold, filled Harry’s lungs in great gulps. 

After exiting the boats, they walked up a flight of stone steps and crowded around the huge, oak front door. 

“Everyone here? You there, still got your toad?” 

Hagrid knocked on the huge oaken door with a similarly huge fist. 

The door swung open at once. They were greeted by a witch wearing elegant, emerald green dress robes. She looked very stern, with her hair pulled back, but her eyes were wise and thoughtful. 

Harry followed the rest of the first years without really thinking, thoughts still bouncing around nervously. The entire place looked really good, Harry thought, like something out of a fairy tale. This, he thought, could become home- a very large and grand one, but there was something that just put him at ease, here.

As they all stood nervously outside the Great Hall, waiting for Professor Minerva McGonagall to return. Harry straightened his beanie to better cover his scar and impossible hair, and next to him, Hermione began to talk rapidly in an undertone. “Did you know that Minerva is another name for Athena? She’s the Roman equivalent of Athena, you know, so that means she’s the goddess of war- war strategies, that is, Mars is the Roman god of war- and also wisdom. Don’t you think that’s just fascinating? They have such nice, interesting names, it makes mine sound a good bit more normal, with all these Bad Faiths and goddesses of war running around.” She laughed breathily. 

“You have a nice name,” Neville said, blushing a little at Hermione’s brilliant, grateful smile. 

The moment was interrupted when a bunch of ghosts floated through the walls. The other kids screeched, huddling closer together, but Hermione simply began to quote a different book. 

Finally, Professor Minerva McGonagall came and lead them inside. The first years formed a single file line- Hermione fell into place behind Harry, Neville behind Hermione, and the Patil twins in front of Harry- and they went into the Great Hall. 

The Great Hall was beautiful- the ceiling looked like the night sky, complete with all the stars. There were four long tables of intimidating-looking older students, some of them chattering excitedly and scanning the first years as though they were looking for someone- it took Harry a long time to realize it was him. When people finally began to realize who he was, he felt his heart sink down to his toes, and he looked up at the ceiling to avoid the stares. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk snuck up closer to Harry’s ear, so she was still hidden, and began hissing soothingly. 

Finally they reached the front. They stood just in front of the professors’ table- there was Professor Dumbledore, twinkly eyes and all, and Harry quickly glanced away, feeling his heart pound hard in his chest, and Hagrid, who smiled at Harry reassuringly and gave him two thumbs up, and a portly, kind-looking witch talking to a tiny professor sitting next to her, and- oh.

It was a bit of a splash of cold water, seeing the dark-robed professor who was looking right at him, a nasty look on his face, with his lank hair, prominent nose, and darkly glittering eyes. Harry felt the familiar pain of being hated for no particular reason he could tell settle over him, like a favorite scrape that never managed to heal, and he felt the hint of a smile on his mouth drop away. 

Hermione nudged him; Professor McGonagall was putting a hat down on a four legged stool. 

He flinched back a little when it suddenly began to belt out a song. 

As the hat was done, the hall burst into applause, and as soon as it settled, Professor McGonagall called the first name- “Abbott, Hannah!” 

She was sorted into Hufflepuff at once; they cheered and clapped loudly, at once moving over for her, and waving merrily; Harry, felt, again, how much he would like to be liked, and how good it would be if he could get into Hufflepuff. 

The sorting, as many things that you wanted to go slowly did, was going rather quickly, and they were already at Hermione. 

“Granger, Hermione!” 

Hermione almost ran to the stool and jammed the hat eagerly on her head. 

“RAVENCLAW!” 

Neville Longbottom was sorted, after a long while, into Gryffindor. 

Malfoy was sorted into Slytherin at once, just as he had hoped. 

The Sorting really was going too fast. Soon they were at P. Parvati went into Gryffindor and Padma into Ravenclaw, and Harry clapped loudly for both of them. Then, “Perks, Sally-Anne”, and-

“Potter, Harry!” 

As Harry stepped forward, whispers suddenly broke out like someone had released a bunch of snakes into the hall. 

He hurried to the stool, eager to get away from the gazes of all the older students. The hat dropped over his eyes- and half his face in fact- and suddenly all he could see was the darkness inside the hat. It smelled a good bit like old socks and itched a little, and Harry squirmed slightly. 

“Hmm,” a small voice said. “What do we have here? A decent bit of courage, a good bit of curiosity and love of knowledge, talent, and a load of self preservation and cunning… now, where to put you?” 

Hufflepuff, Harry thought. I need to get into Hufflepuff, I want proper friends- I’m a hard worker, I can be very nice. 

“Hm, really? I didn’t even consider Hufflepuff.” 

I want friends, Harry thought at last, I want to be liked, I want…

“How do you feel about Gryffindor, they’re sure to be fans of you,” The Hat sounded almost wheedling- but just as swiftly the Hat seemed to change its mind. “No, that’s all wrong- Slytherin, perhaps? You could be great, you know, it’s all here in your head, and Slytherin will help you on your way to greatness, no doubt about that.” 

“You could be great.” The words seemed to expand a balloon in Harry’s chest. He could be- great. He wasn’t sure if he really could be great, but, he had just- survived- for so long. He was tough, he knew that, he didn’t think Dudley could have endured half the things Harry had. Harry may be selfish- the Dursleys would have thought so- but he wanted more than what he had now. 

The Hat chuckled. “Well then, better be- SLYTHERIN!” 

He took off the hat, smoothing it down a little in the shocked silence. His eyes caught on where Neville and Parvati were sitting together, and Harry offered an apologetic half-smile and a little shrug, and then, having dawdled as much as possible, finally put the hat down, and started towards the table with the green banners- it had begun to applaud, finally, and after a moment the other houses joined, still quiet and a little shocked. 

Harry found a seat near the end of the table, with two empty spaces next to it, almost as far away from the clearly popular and important people as possible, avoiding the looks that he was getting. 

“Blaise, Zabini” was sorted into Slytherin and he walked right over and slid into the spot between Harry and a slim, quiet first year who Harry couldn’t remember the name of. 

Professor Dumbledore had gotten to his feet. “Welcome!” He said. “Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!” 

All the other tables clapped and cheered, but at Slytherin there was only a smattering of polite applause, and Harry had to struggle to keep his face from expressing his confusion and dislike with regard to the Headmaster. 

He saw Zabini glancing at him subtly, and as food suddenly began to appear on the plates around them, Zabini said, rather loudly and with a healthy helping of natural charisma, “I always have wondered if some sort of… experimental charm, perhaps?... hit him when he was a child.” 

That got a bit of a dry chuckle from Harry, and Zabini glanced at him, his eyes catching ever so briefly over the green beanie where the lightning scar would be, and then flashed a smile-smirk hybrid that looked like he was laughing at a really exceptional joke no one else knew. 

“I’m Blaise Zabini,” He said, nodding politely. 

“Ah,” Harry winced slightly, “Harry Potter, but I suppose you probably already know that,” He finished a little awkwardly. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk slid out of his robes and curled softly around Harry, hissing a warning at Zabini, whose face briefly flashed with surprise, then slid into neutrality. 

Zabini smirked again. “I think everyone does. Why are you wearing that cap?” 

“Maybe he’s cold,” The girl on Zabini’s other side piped up, “Not everything is for some greater purpose, you know.” 

“An excellent point, Miss… ” Zabini conceded graceful. 

“Tracey Davis.” She looked down at her plate, blushing slightly. “Halfblood,” She added with a bit of embarrassment. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed, “ssshe sssmellsss like anxiety.” Harry petted Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk into silence. 

“An excellent point, Miss Davis,” Zabini repeated. 

She smiled slightly. “Thank you, Mr. Zabini.” Her gaze flickered to Harry. “Harry Potter, right?” 

“Yeah.” 

Her eyes flickered to his forehead too, and Harry sighed, pulling off his beanie and revealing both his atrocious hair and the scar.

“I see why you were wearing a beanie,” Zabini murmured distractedly, his eyes glued to the thin white scar.

Harry hesitated a half instant, unsure if the comment was malicious, but decided to hit back a little with a sardonic, “Because it’s cold, obviously.” 

Zabini and Davis both laughed, so he knew he had gotten it right. 

“Did you know,” Zabini remarked lightly, “Draco has been telling half of us about how he just so happened to meet Harry Potter, all disguised in an emerald green cap, in Diagon Alley a week or two after getting his letter.” 

Harry groaned. “I give up.” 

Zabini laughed, loud and easy, but maybe a hint too loud, like he was trying to attract the attention of everyone else, to point out that he was talking to Harry Potter.

The feast ended after rather too long- sitting there, eating just a little so he wouldn’t throw it all up later, when everything smelt so delicious, was torturous- and the prefect started leading them to the common room. 

Harry followed all the green-clad first years out of the Great Hall. The Slytherins brushed passed the Ravenclaws as they did so; Harry caught the eyes of Padma and Hermione. Hermione grinned encouragingly, waving enthusiastically. Padma smiled sweetly and mouthed “remember about the catalogue”. Harry nodded to Padma, and then to Hermione as well. 

Harry turned back to follow the other Slytherins and saw, out of the corner of his eye, a look of mild disgust on the face of the boy in front of Harry, like Harry had seen on Malfoy’s face; but when Harry glanced subtly over at Davis and Zabini, their faces were smooth, neutral.

The prefect began to talk about Heads of Houses, high standards, prefects and a Professor Snape, but Harry didn’t pay much attention, just picking up a little here and there, as he was too busy looking around. The common room was beautiful; there was a low hum of conversation, as older students bent, chattering happily, over old books, or lounged on couches, or watched strange, assorted sea creatures float by, in the greenish-tinted water that you can see through the huge window that made up one of the entire walls. 

It was, Harry thought, not at all normal, what with the floating candles and window into the sea, but after years with the stiflingly perfectly normal Dursleys, he was glad that it wasn’t.

The prefect finally wound down, and the first years headed to their new dorms. 

The dorms were big; the large, luxurious beds had thick green curtains to pull around them for privacy. There were big windows, with window seats, that let you look into the lake. The walls were painted green, and the floor was elegantly polished wood. Floating candles helped to light up the relatively dim room; the light spread evenly across the room and kept it almost as bright as daylight, which was probably the result of magic. 

Each bed had a trunk at it; Harry’s bed was, luckily, far from Malfoy’s- how was he going to survive sharing a dorm with the git, really?- he ended up next to someone named Theodore Nott, who turned out to be a skinny boy with a slightly rabbity looking face. 

Harry ran his hand over the pillow, feeling a little jump in his heart, of delight; Aunt Petunia may have moved him to the second bedroom, recently, but the bed there was stripped down just for that purpose; no blankets, no pillow, only a mattress. Harry had never gotten a pillow before, especially not one so big, so fluffy. Harry let Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk down onto his pillow. 

The other boys went to bed quickly; they to the bathroom to brush their teeth. Harry saw that they used brushes that look completely different from his, made out of elegant wood, with strange bristles, but he pulled out his own muggle toothbrush, and lathered up his mouth with minty muggle toothpaste, his face completely blank. He was used to being the freak, the odd one out. Why would he have thought it different here- even if they did give him a pillow?

Harry took a little longer than the other boys, so that when he changed, no one was there to see the way his ribs protruded from his skinny chest. At least there weren’t any bruises- Dudley hadn’t been Harry Hunting ever since they had found out about the letter, scared Harry might use magic on him. 

Harry curled up in bed, pulling his curtains shut. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk curled up right next to him, and it made him feel slightly better, but he could hear the other boys moving, shifting slightly as they get to sleep, and the little noises put him on edge. He shifted uncomfortably- he felt so vulnerable, trying to get to sleep with Malfoy, and all these other boys he didn't know at all, so close. Close enough to come and rough him up when he’s half-asleep. 

Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed soothingly about how if any of them tried to hurt her pet human, she would bite them absolutely everywhere, bite them so hard their skin stained red with all the spilt blood. At last Harry fell asleep on the pillow that was surely too soft to be his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Somewhere in Hogwarts, a bunch of children are having an existential crisis around the Sorting of their favorite Boy-Who-Lived. 
> 
> Somewhere in the dungeons, Professor Snape is having a well-deserved drink. 
> 
> We know exactly where Harry is, but that doesn't mean he isn't stressed too.


	6. reflexes and suspicion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry starts to settle into Hogwarts a little. Draco Malfoy turns out to be, perhaps, a different, subtler type of bully than Dudley, and Professor Snape seems to hate Harry. Harry does bond with some other students, though.

Harry’s instinct, as soon as he felt the softness beneath him, was screaming for him to get out, get out, Uncle Vernon will kill me! He scrambled out of under the blankets, and was halfway through rolling out of bed when he realized where he was. He hadn’t somehow ended up in someone else’s bed. This was his bed, and Uncle Vernon didn’t know about where he was sleeping.

Harry sat on his covers, breathing deeply, and slowly, over and over. He could feel the residue of a nightmare clinging to him. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk was gone; she had probably left to go hunting, or exploring, having evidently decided none of the boys were threats to Harry. 

It was probably super early; Harry was used to waking up at an ungodly hour to do chores, and even when he’d moved to the second bedroom and not had to wake up quite as early, his body had stuck in the habit. 

He supposed it was good, though, Harry reflected as he grabbed some school clothes and headed to the bathroom. This would make it way easier to hide just how skinny he was. 

When he was done showering- he allowed himself almost an entire hour to just enjoy the warmth of the water- he quickly pulled on his clothes. He was standing in front of the mirror, working over the tie, when he heard footsteps approaching. Harry could feel himself tensing up, but he continued his work, keeping his eye on the door through the mirror. 

It was just Zabini, wearing silken pajamas and carrying some shower things. Harry relaxed a little. He had thought it might be Malfoy, coming to rough him up a bit before class. 

Zabini’s cool eyes lingered on Harry’s attempt at a knot, made worse by Harry’s anxiety. One eyebrow elegantly quirked. “Here, let me fix it.” Harry tensed again at Zabini’s fingers near his neck, but Zabini retied it quickly, without taking advantage of Harry’s vulnerability. “There you go.” Harry, feeling embarrassed, smiled slightly sheepishly. “Thanks.” 

Zabini nodded in that easy, charismatic way of his and headed to the shower. 

Harry was stood there in front of the mirror for a moment, feeling the shame of always being the strange one- can’t even tie a tie, tenses at a friendly touch- rise up again. But Harry swallowed it down a little roughly, smoothed out his face and tie, turned on his heel and left the bathroom. 

Harry knelt in front of his trunk, whispering the Parseltongue password. He pulled out the messenger bag he bought with money from his trust fund.

Harry heard Malfoy stir as he moved out of his bed, and hurriedly moved so he was sitting on his bed. This made it harder to fill his bag up, but he didn’t want to be sitting on the floor while Malfoy was standing. 

Harry was steadfastly ignoring Malfoy as he walked by, when Malfoy slipped on a quill Harry had left on the floor in his hurry. 

Flushing, Malfoy scrambled to his feet. “I’d be careful, Potter,” he sneered, brushing himself off. “My father could crush you like a bug under his foot.” 

Harry looked at him blandly, not knowing what to say. Ignoring bullies had worked well for him in the past, so he just went back to packing, keeping Malfoy in his peripheral vision. 

Malfoy huffed and walked to the bathroom.

As soon as Malfoy was gone, Harry reached down and grabbed the quill from the floor, gently letting out a breath. 

As soon as he was packed, he left the dorm, heading to the common room, which was buzzing with other early wakers. He could feel a few people looking at him, giving each other little nudges, so he left quickly, figuring he could just ask a portrait for directions. The portraits didn’t care about some lightning scar. 

He sat down at the Slytherin table- it was mostly empty, as were all the other tables. He could feel the few other early breakfasters looking at him, just like the Slytherins had in the common room, except less subtly. 

“Harry!” 

Harry looked up and saw Hermione hurrying into the Great Hall, books stuffed into a bulging book bag. “Harry! You wouldn’t believe the Ravenclaw Tower- it’s so beautiful! We’ve got all the stars mapped out on the ceiling, kind of like the Great Hall, and so many books, I’ve already checked out about five, and everyone there is so great! You would really love it, I think, I wish we were in the same house, what’s Slytherin like?” 

“Um, well,” Harry said, swallowing the apple slice he had been chewing. “They- I mean, we- have this huge window to the lake, so that you can see all the sea creatures swimming by. Last night I thought I might have seen a mermaid, swimming past. It’s down in the dungeons- but it’s not cold, it’s actually really cozy.” 

“That sounds so beautiful,” Hermione gushed. “I wonder if the glass has to be specially enchanted to withstand the water pressure, or if they just do things the muggle way-” 

“Hey, Hermione,” Padma said, “balanced breakfast, remember.” 

“Oh, but I wanted to talk with Harry, and it’s not like I could sit at the Slytherin table, or he could sit at the Ravenclaw table, so-” 

“Come on, Harry, you can sit with us,” Padma said. “I doubt anyone will even notice, it’ll be fine.” 

“Oh, I don’t know…” Hermione sighed. 

“You won’t be able to talk to Harry otherwise, I bet,” Padma said. “It’ll be fine.”

They found seats at the Ravenclaw table. Harry still wasn’t eating much, and Hermione seemed to notice, but all the Ravenclaws were so busy introducing themselves to Harry, so she couldn’t really say anything. Harry left for History of Magic before too many people arrived; he could see some of his fellow Slytherins eyeing him from their table and he felt pretty nervous over it. 

He didn’t like History of Magic at all, as it turned out. Really, a ghost?

It seemed to take forever for the bell to ring, but at last, it did. Harry stood, and followed the rest of the Slytherins out. Their next class was Charms, with Professor Flitwick. To get there, they had to walk through some of the more populated corridors, where there were loads of upper years. As Harry walked by, carrying on a slightly awkward conversation with Davis, he could hear the upper years talking.

“There, next to the girl with the brown hair and blue eyes.” 

“...survived the killing curse…” 

“I can’t believe he’s really a Slytherin.” 

“I heard some people think… defeated You-Know-Who because… to be… Dark Lord...” 

“Did you see his scar?” 

Harry tried his best to ignore them all, but it was very disconcerting. He was used to being ignored, not the subject of everyone’s attention. The entire thing made it rather harder to find his classes. 

Professor Flitwick, who taught Charms, was a tiny little wizard who stood on a stack of books to see over his desk. As Professor Flitwick began to take role, Harry heard Malfoy whispering to Nott in an undertone. 

“I’m sure he’s a half breed,” Malfoy said in a low voice. “Look at his size. He’s almost as bad as that gamekeeper fellow- goblins are a bit tamer than giants, you know, but still. Having a half breed teach here, really?” 

Harry could see Daphne Greengrass and Zabini, who were sitting near Malfoy as well, nodding along. 

“It’s rather like with half blooded wizards, isn’t it,” Malfoy continued, still so lowly Harry wouldn’t have heard it if he and Davis hadn’t ended up so close to Malfoy as well. “Except, it’s muggle blood in them, not goblin or giant. Almost worse, don’t you think- at least goblins or giants have magic in them.” 

Harry glanced over and saw that Zabini was frowning, though when Malfoy glanced at Zabini, Zabini had his expression smoothed out before Malfoy could notice anything at all. 

The Dursleys had called Harry and his dad things like that, too. When forced to talk about Harry’s mother at all, the Dursleys tended to remark that if she had just married a man who was “properly, fully English”, everything would have turned out so much better, and then fall into a rant about immigrants and those damned mixed race couples. 

Of course, Harry thought, his nails digging into his palm, people here would think those kind of things too. With the Dursleys, Harry couldn’t win because he was magical, because he wasn’t “properly, fully English” like his mother had been. With people like Malfoy, he couldn’t win because of his muggleborn mother, because of being raised by muggles. It was stupid. 

The next day, Harry slept in a little bit more than usual. He was exiting the shower, already dressed, when he saw that Malfoy was standing in front of the mirror, idly spreading something through his hair. Harry’s entire body tensed up, and he eyed Malfoy warily. 

“What, never heard of Sleekeazy’s?” Malfoy drawled, turning around. “Oh wait, you haven’t. Practically a muggleborn, aren’t you?” He pursed his lips at the sight of Harry’s hair- it always got even curlier when it was wet. 

“And those glasses. Accio!” Malfoy shook his head condescendingly, and with a swift motion, his wand was out, and he was flicking and swishing it. Harry’s wand was up his own sleeve, but he didn’t know any spells to protect himself, so he just sidestepped where he figured the spell would come out. But there wasn’t a bolt of light as a hex hit him- instead, his glasses were sliding off his nose, flying through the air toward Malfoy. 

Harry stared at the blurry Malfoy, his body tense, waiting for Malfoy to throw a punch, but Malfoy just continued taunting him, before sticking his arm out towards Harry, intending to flick at Harry’s badly knotted tie. 

But Harry didn’t know that. His reflexes kicked in and he swiftly side stepped, surprised it had taken Malfoy this long to get around to beating him up. Malfoy didn’t swing his fist at where Harry had just been, he was looking at Harry in confusion, surprised at his quick reflexes. 

He moved his hand towards Harry, again with the intent of mocking his tie, and Harry grabbed his wrist and turned it aside with enough force Malfoy took a few steps back. Malfoy frowned at him as he regained his balance, smoothed down his robes, then threw Harry’s glasses to the ground. Harry plucked them out of the air with nimble fingers and slipped them back up his nose, and watched as Malfoy strode out, looking frustrated. 

The first class of the day was Transfiguration, which was taught by Professor McGonagall. She seemed stiff and generally someone not to cross- especially because she might have known about Harry’s situation without doing anything about it. The permanently-frowning look on her face reminded Harry of Aunt Petunia, and Harry resolved not to get in her way. The other Slytherins seemed to figure the same thing, and were quite attentive in her class. 

After that, they had Herbology, which was fun. The professor was a plump short witch with dirt under her fingers, and a sun-tanned face. In her class, they learned how to take care of all the strange plants and fungi, and what they were used for. Later, talking with Neville during lunch break, Harry learned Herbology was Neville’s favorite class. 

Following Herbology, it was Defense Against the Dark Arts, which was taught with Professor Quirrell, the Professor whose hand Harry had shaken in the Leaky Cauldron. Everyone had been looking forward to it quite a bit, but it was a real disappointment. Professor Quirrell stutter through all of what he said, and the classroom smelled quite intensely of garlic. The smell must be too much for Harry, because about twenty minutes in class, Harry started to develop a headache. It didn’t seem too bad at first, but by the end of class, Harry couldn’t concentrate at all. Almost as soon as Harry left, the headache was gone too. Harry resolved to try to drink more water- maybe he was just dehydrated. 

That night, they had Astronomy, too. Harry decided almost at once that it was one of his favorite classes; he had always liked the stars, and he had a pretty good memory, so learning star location and names wouldn’t be too hard. 

On Friday, they had their first class with the Gryffindors. 

“This is going to be interesting,” Zabini remarked, raising a single eyebrow at Harry’s tie as he elegantly knotted his own. 

Harry blushed slightly, but didn’t accept Zabini’s unspoken offer. “If by interesting, you mean a really bad idea, then yes,” Harry put in dryly. 

Zabini laughed. “True. Come on, it’s not too early for breakfast.” 

As Harry and Zabini navigated their way to the Great Hall, Zabini conversationally asked, “Why do you get up so early? I thought I was an early riser- though that could just be in comparison to Malfoy.” 

Harry’s shoulders tensed up. “I guess I just function better in the morning,” he said lightly. “Ssslsh- I mean, my snake, often wakes up early to go hunting.” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk had been busy the past few days exploring the castle. Harry had enjoyed hearing about her adventures, and was so grateful she had come with him to Hogwarts. 

Zabini nodded thoughtfully. 

They ate breakfast pretty quickly- Harry received a letter from Hagrid, which was a first, but a welcome one- and then headed to Potions. Despite heading out early, they ended up getting lost, so came in a little on the later side. 

There was a free table, as well as a free spot next to Ronald Weasley, and a free spot next to Tracey Davis. Zabini glanced at Harry- he was hoping to pair up with Potter, it would be a good way to publically cement them as associates, and perhaps get on first name basis- but Potter had already slid into the seat next to Weasley, seeming to have not seen the look Zabini was giving him. 

With a sigh so gentle no one could possibly notice, Zabini sat next to Tracey Davis, turning his signature smile upon the girl. Davis may be half blood, and therefore a possible source of controversy in Zabini’s association with Draco, but Zabini had already explained his going after Potter to Draco, and the girl had managed to integrate herself, if only slightly, with Potter. 

“Hi,” Harry whispered to the boy from the station. “I’m Harry, Harry Potter.” 

The boy looked at Harry a little warily. “Weasley. Ron Weasley.”

Professor Snape swept into the classroom, all dark, billowing robes and even darker glares for the Gryffindors. 

When he read the roll, he paused at Harry’s name. “Ah yes,” he said softly. “Harry Potter.” He glanced at Harry, or more accurately where Harry was sitting, and his brows rose. “I was under the impression you were a Slytherin.” Draco Malfoy chuckled quietly.

“I am, sir,” Harry said quietly. 

There was a pause, and then Professor Snape slowly returned to reading off roll call. 

When he had made sure that everyone was present, he began to speak. Professor Snape barely spoke above a whisper, and yet everyone in the class was completely in tune to what he was saying; there was no way you could ignore this man. 

“Potter!” said Snape suddenly. “What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?” 

Harry glanced at Weasley, who looked as stumped as he was; Zabini, on the other hand, had a look on his face like he knew the answer, but couldn’t tell Harry because then Snape would rip into him too. 

“I don’t know, sir,” Harry said in a small voice, keeping his face neutral on his eyes on his desk. Perhaps if he made himself an uninteresting, boring target, Professor Snape would leave him alone. 

“Tut, tut- fame clearly isn’t everything. Let’s try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?”

“Um.” Harry had really, absolutely no idea. His hands were shaking in the fists he had curled them into, and he was worried he would do something very stupid, like antagonizing Snape with the sassy answer of “Probably in a Potion’s supply shop, sir, all things considered.” Harry allowed himself a slow, calming breath. He had endured worse from the Dursleys. He supposed he had just been hoping for some nice people. That was too much for someone like Harry to ask for, though. 

“Potter? Would you be willing to gift us lowly mortals with an answer?” 

“I’m afraid I don’t know, sir,” Harry said, unable to meet the professor’s dark eyes. 

The interrogation continued. 

“What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?” 

This one niggled something in the back of Harry’s mind; he had read something over the summer in his Herbology book. 

“Um,” Harry said slowly, “aren’t they… the same thing?” 

After that dressing down disguised as a series of innocent questions, things got a little bit better. Professor Snape began to lecture on basic potion making procedures, and Harry took notes.

“He’s usually nice to Slytherins, I’ve heard” Ron said in an undertone, seeming more friendly now. “I wonder what it was about you.” 

Harry winced slightly, murmuring back without moving his lips, “Yeah. It would probably be even worse for me if I was in Gryffindor, if it’s this bad as a Slytherin.” 

Professor Snape began to approach and they both shut up at once.

Potions was the last class of the day, and as Harry packed up, he saw the look on Malfoy’s face and knew what was coming; there would be something about not being a proper Slytherin, about how he didn’t eat at the Slytherin table very much during the week, and now he had paired up with Weasley. There would be hexes, or perhaps punches. “Hey, Ron, wanna go visit Hagrid?” 

Ron looked at him in confusion, and Harry leaned in and whispered quickly, “Malfoy’s really pissed. Let’s get out of here.” 

Ron hesitated then nodded and said loudly, “Yeah, of course, how could I forget!” An obvious feint, but really, what could you expect from a Gryffindor? Both of them hurried out.

“I thought you were mates with Malfoy,” Ron said. “You know, being a Slytherin.” 

“Nope, he hates my guts,” Harry said. “I turned down his offer of friendship after he basically told me, ‘don’t be friends with Hermione, muggleborns aren’t really people’.” 

Ron looked at Harry with renewed respect and said, “pretty decent of ya, mate.” 

Harry shrugged. “I didn’t know about Hogwarts until my eleventh birthday, so now that he knows that, he hates me too.” 

Hagrid lived in a small wooden house at the edge of the forbidden forest. The stout, rotund house had several large, round windows, vines growing all over it, and even a pipe poking out of the roof to let out steam and smoke. There was a small pumpkin patch to the side, watched over by a dragon-inspired scarecrow, complete with wings made out of shiny silk, and a head made out of copper that winked brightly in the afternoon sun. A crossbow and a pair of galoshes were outside the front door. 

Harry was torn between thinking it rather picturesque, and also thinking it probably didn’t fulfill the health and safety codes, all things considered. 

Inside, it was rather similar. There was fresh game dangling by its feet from the ceiling, roughly-carved pumpkins with what looked like homemade candles sat here and there, and, off to the side, there was a bed larger than any Harry had seen in his life- one just the right size for Hagrid. 

“Make yerselves at home,” Hagrid said, beginning to make them some tea. 

“This is Ron,” Harry introduced him, waving at hand at the skinny redhead. 

“Another Weasley, eh?” Hagrid glanced at Ron. “An’ a Gryffindor, too, I see. Well, congrats from me.” 

Hagrid went back to pouring tea, adding, as he looked over at Harry, “Not ter say I’m not proud of yeh, Harry. Did’n expect it, that’s fer sure, but if yer happy there, and they aren’t treatin’ you too badly…” 

“They aren’t,” Harry said firmly. 

The rock cakes were far more similar to rocks than cakes, but the tea was actually quite good, and Harry enjoyed a cup or two of it as he and Ron told Hagrid about their first lessons. As they were in different houses, their tales differed sometimes, too, but they both had the same things to say about Potions. 

“He seemed to really hate me,” Harry added, with a wry grin like this wasn’t an issue for him. 

“He hates all th’ students,” Hagrid said 

“Not the Slytherins, he doesn’t,” Ron said darkly. “He’s nice to them. And yet that doesn’t go over with him, for Harry. He’s nastier to Harry than he is to any of the Gryffindors, even. He seems to really have something against him. Anyone can tell.” 

“Rubbish! Why should he?” Hagrid protested, then quickly and quite transperently turned the subject to Ron’s brother, Charlie, who apparently worked with dragons. While dragons were actually quite fascinating- Harry could sort of understand why Hagrid wanted one- Harry found himself reading a clip left out on the round, chipped table they were sitting at. 

Gringotts had been robbed. On his birthday. And according to the newspaper, the vault the thieves had tried to steal from had been emptied the same day. Could it have been vault seven hundred and thirteen? The vault with the grubby little package too high security for even Gringotts? 

Ron left for Gryffindor Tower, and Harry headed off to go finish his homework in the library. 

As soon as he entered the library, he saw Hermione; she was absolutely surrounded in huge piles and piles of books. Harry headed over.

“Hello, Hermione.” 

She looked up. “Oh, hello Harry, do be careful to whisper, if you please, the librarian is very strict about keeping things quiet- what are you doing here?” 

“I was planning on doing some homework,” Harry said, then, preparing himself for rejection, “Maybe I could sit with you?” 

She beamed and hurriedly unstacked one of her walls of books so there was room for Harry next to her. “Of course, of course- I’m very glad to see you doing your homework, I know I haven’t seen Parvati in here once since the beginning of the year. It is rather too bad we all got different houses, you know, I hope we’ll all still be friends.” She hesitated, licking her lips like she was about to do something she wasn’t sure about. Then, she added, “Personally, I think they should have the houses mixed up more. It would promote more interhouse friendships, you know. I bet the rivalry wouldn’t be so bad.” 

Harry nodded as he began to take out his things. 

“Professor Flitwick is very adamant about having us express our thoughts, even if they disagree with the norm, or the person in charge, as long as we have logic and evidence to back it up,” Hermione explained. “He even arranged, a couple of years ago, to start having Ravenclaw Debate Nights every Friday night.” 

Hermione paused to take a breath, and saw that Harry was working on his Astronomy homework. 

“Oh, Astronomy. How do you like that?” 

“Pretty well, thanks. I’ve always liked stars, and I have a decent memory. Not as good as yours, though, obviously.” 

Hermione blushed with pleasure. “Thank you, that’s very kind of you to say. Did you know that all the stars are actually suns like ours, creating light through nuclear fusion?” 

“Well, I can't explain nuclear fusion, but I knew the rest,” Harry said. 

Hermione flushed, this time with embarrassment. “Sorry, you’re right- I quite forgot you went to muggle primary. It’s quite refreshing- I mentioned that in Astronomy, and all the other students were rather confused and surprised. Most of them seemed to know the bit about suns and stars being the same things, but you should have seen their faces when I mentioned nuclear fusion. I don't know if grown-up wizards and witches know that sort of thing, but the young ones sure haven't learnt it. One particularly immature boy, Louie Marleigh, told me he didn’t believe me, that muggles didn’t know anything wizards didn’t, and he seemed to think they were quite dumb in general.” 

“Those Americans who landed on the moon were muggles, weren't they,” Harry remarked, nails digging into his palms. 

“Perhaps I'll tell them all about it.” 

Harry finished off his Astronomy homework pretty quickly, with not much help from Hermione. She looked at him a little sadly as he packed it away, clearly expecting him to leave. Remembering his own loneliness back at the Dursleys, Harry decided to stay- even though he didn’t feel like doing the rest of his homework. 

“Would you be willing to help with something else, other than homework?” Harry asked slowly, again feeling himself gear up for rejection. 

“Okay,” Hermione said with a smile. “What is it?” 

Harry explained about the vault, and his birthday, and the grubby little package. 

“Hmm,” Hermione said slowly. “It could just be a coincidence, but it’s true that probably not many people take things out of Gringotts because it’s not high security enough, as far as I can tell Gringotts is very high security. But, Harry, your story is rather vague, you know- I don’t know if I can figure this all out without more information.” 

Harry nodded. 

“But- perhaps I could research Gringotts for you?” Hermione offered. “I doubt I’ll be able to find anything, but it might, perhaps, be a bit of help? And you could write down everything you remember from that day- it’s a slim chance, but maybe you could find some little detail that might tip you off to something…” 

Harry nodded. “Just like Sherlock Holmes,” he murmured.

Hermione looked over with bright eyes. “You’ve read Sherlock Holmes?” She said and then promptly dissolved into a pile of verbal vomit. 

As Hermione talked on and on, Harry resolved to see if he could get a little more information out of Hagrid, if possible. Next time he visited would probably be a good time, he decided. He should see if he could wriggle some more information about Snape out, too; Hagrid clearly knew something he wasn’t telling Harry…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All things considered, I doubt wix have a very comprehensive knowledge of the science behind stars. Hermione's fellow Ravenclaws are of course fascinated at this new knowledge, as well as the other things Hermione knows that most wix don't.
> 
> Also- silly Harry, what health and safety codes?


	7. rules and rulebreaking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Populating flying lessons with a bunch of kids that hate each other is a great idea. Harry avoids breaking the rules, until he doesn't.

This was torture, in more ways than one. 

The Slytherins were set to have flying lessons with the Gryffindors that afternoon, and it just so happened that the last class before flying lessons was DADA. Under Professor Quirrell's painfully stutter-filled lecture, Harry could hear Malfoy’s smooth, drawling voice, probably telling the other Slytherins about the boastful tale of him, his broom, and the Muggle Helicopter of Doom, for the five hundredth time, making it even harder to concentrate.

In addition, Harry’s head was hurting. The headaches, which occurred every DADA class, were slowly but surely getting worse; at first, Harry been able to ignore it completely, but now, Harry kept finding himself a sentence or two behind in his notes, or realizing he’d zoned out for a moment or two, distracted by the pain. 

As Harry left the classroom, Harry sucked in huge gulps of fresh, garlic-free air. As he headed towards flying lessons with the rest of Slytherin, he could feel his headache receding. Maybe he had some sort of allergic reaction to garlic? Harry thought, recalling the time Dudley had gotten hives on his hands from touching mint, and had been allowed to stay home from school and play video games for two entire weeks to help him “recover”. No, Harry had cooked with garlic back at the Dursleys’, that couldn’t be it. 

Harry shoved the thoughts away; he needed to be as ready as he could be, for flying lessons. Hermione had given him tons and tons of tips, when he visited the library to work with her on homework or hear what she’d learnt about Gringotts. Harry thought that Hermione must have read fifteen or twenty books on flying, and Quidditch, for that matter; she had taught him all the rules of the game, and had even tried to teaching him the fouls. After they both knew the rules, he, Hermione and Padma all ripped into the game quite viciously, with Hermione proclaiming at last that it was perhaps the most illogical sport of all time

Still, tips and knowledge of Quidditch fouls didn’t guarantee that Harry would be able to actually fly very well. Harry really wasn’t looking forward to humiliating himself in front of Malfoy, who was sure to make a big deal out of it all. 

The Slytherins were there before the Gryffindors, of course. Each Slytherin found one of the better brooms, and situated themselves so they were near it, and would be able to quickly grab onto it when the time came, leaving the Gryffindors with the shoddy, wobbly sort of brooms no one wanted. 

The Gryffindors hurried in, looking rather dishevelled, about a minute and a half before class began; Neville waved at Harry shyly, Parvati grinning at him quite enthusiastically from next to Lavender Brown- when Madam Hooch arrived. 

“Stick your right hand over your broom and say ‘Up!’” she instructed them. 

Harry sternly told his broom, “Up!”, thinking of how he would talk to a dog, and up it rose. Perhaps the tips in Quidditch Through the Ages weren’t so useless at all. 

They then learned how to mount and grip their brooms and Madam Hooch was just about to blow the whistle and have them go into the air for the first time, when things went badly for Neville. 

He must have been nervous about getting left on the ground, because he kicked off suddenly, and rose quickly, then his grip, sweaty on the handle, slipped and he fell, hitting the ground with a nasty whamming noise, followed by a cracking sound that didn’t sound good at all. 

Madam Hooch helped Longbottom up, then turned to the rest of the class. “None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you’ll be out of Hogwarts before you can say ‘Quidditch.’” She paused with dramatics that Professor Snape himself would have been proud of, and then, with a stern look on her face that reminded Harry of Professor McGonagall, turned away from the class and towards Longbottom, who flinched back a little. “Come on, dear.” 

Neville, a look of vague surprise on his tear-streaked face, hobbled off with Madam Hooch. 

“Did you see his face, the great lump?” Malfoy asked, laughing rather cruelly. 

“Shut up, Malfoy,” Parvati snapped right back.

“Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom? Never thought you’d like fat little crybabies, Parvati.” 

Parvati looked like she was about to say something cutting back, but Malfoy was distracted by something shiny. 

“Look! It’s that stupid thing Longbottom’s gran sent him.” 

“Give it here, Malfoy,” Ron spoke up. 

“As if I need to listen to a dirty little Weasel like you,” Malfoy sneered, then added with a nasty little smile, “I suppose you want one, seeing as your mother never could afford toys for you and the other Weasels, could she?” 

“Malfoy,” Harry said quietly, “Why don’t you put that silly trinket down? Surely as a Malfoy, you have much better toys to play with.” 

Everyone stopped talking to watch. Ron was smiling, glad to see someone taking a stand against Malfoy; Zabini and Nott both had calculating sort of looks on their faces. 

“You’re right,” Malfoy said, “I don’t need a silly trinket like this. I think I’ll leave it somewhere for Longbottom to find- how about- up a tree?” He kicked off, the broom rising high into the air. 

“What subtly! What cunning!” Harry yelled after him, voice absolutely dripping with contempt and sarcasm. His hands, balled up into fists, shook, and he was pumping with heady, fearful adrenaline. “I’m so glad to see that the heir of the most impressive house of Malfoy will be expelled in the second week of school!” 

Harry heard Zabini laugh, and several of the Gryffindors chuckle as well, so he finished off with one last sarcastic, “Thanks for making Slytherin proud!” 

“Come and make me get back down, Potter,” Malfoy taunted. “Or how about you, Weasel? What, afraid of heights? What a marvellous Gryffindor you make!” 

“Give it here, Malfoy!” Ron shouted, face getting red. 

“Come and get it!” Malfoy hollered back, smirking. 

Ron kicked off, flying unsteadily, wobbling and slow, up towards Malfoy. 

“A real professional Quidditch player, this one,” Malfoy sneered, and Ron flushed even further. 

“Give it here!” 

“Fetch!” Malfoy moved as if to lob the glass ball away from the line of brooms, but it was just a feint. Ron raced off the wrong way, and Malfoy lobbed the glass ball at the line of students instead, hitting Harry in the nose, hard. Harry flinched but managed to catch it as it bounced off. 

“RON WEASLEY!” came an impressively loud yell. 

Ron flinched upon his broom. Professor McGonagall was running towards them, clearly quite furious. Wobbling, Ron began to slowly descend; Harry slipped the Rememberall up his sleeve and resolving to get it back to the Neville somehow. 

“-Might have broken your neck!” Professor McGonagall was just finishing. She spun on her heel. “Malfoy! Don’t think I didn’t see you two up there, either. Parvati Patil, you go inform Professor Snape, would you? As for the rest of you, if you dare even breathe out of line after this fiasco-” 

The entire class nodded, even scrambling off their brooms so as to look less suspicious. 

Professor McGonagall gave a slow once-over, and finding them sufficiently cowed so as to probably not make more trouble, spun on her heel and strode off. Ron trailed awkwardly in her wake.

Parvati Patil followed them towards the castle, frowning. Harry watched her go, eternally grateful it was Malfoy who was in trouble, and not Harry.

Malfoy began to say something, but Harry didn’t pay attention. He was too busy trying to wipe his blood off of Neville’s Rememberal. 

“Potter. You’re bleeding,” Zabini said, brow slightly furrowed. 

“Oh.” Harry pressed a hand to his nose, trying to stem the bleeding. 

“You should probably go to the hospital wing,” Tracey Davis spoke up. 

“Oh, um... it's not that big of a deal,” Harry said, a little bit confused. After a moment, he added to Zabini in an undertone, "God, I’m glad I’m not Malfoy right now. Snape would have sent me home in several hundred small chunks.” 

Blaise wondered if Potter realized that him getting expelled would have never even been on the cards. Potter was the Boy-Who-Lived, and Dumbledore- well, Blaise didn’t think Dumbledore had expelled someone in decades. Then again, it was true that Professor Snape did seem to have it out for Potter. 

Unsurprisingly, Malfoy didn’t seem to be affected by whatever his punishment was- it was probably writing “I will not get caught” fifty times anyway- and was in a high mood the next morning in the Great Hall. “I wonder how Weasley’s enjoying his last meal,” He said loudly, but he was looking right at Harry. 

Ron, who was just entering the Great Hall, must have heard, because he approached, scowling with offense. “I’ll be staying at Hogwarts, thanks,” Ron said. “Though if you and the rest of your little gang were the only company, I don’t think I would bother.” 

Malfoy sneered at Ron. “I’d take you on anytime on my own. Tonight, if you want. Wizard’s duel. Wands only- no contact. What’s the matter? Too scared to duel me, Weasel?” 

“Of course not,” Ron said quickly, recklessly. “Who’ll be your second?” 

“Crabbe,” Malfoy said after a moment. “What about yours?” 

Ron had just opened his mouth to reply when Professor McGonagall appeared on the horizon, and the little group broke up before they could specify a time. 

That afternoon, Harry realized that he still had Neville’s rememberall. He left the Slytherin common room and headed up, deeper into the castle, figuring he could ask some of the portraits for directions. 

“Do you know where the Gryffindor common room is?” Harry politely asked a sneering portrait of a woman in scarlet. Her brown hair was bound in braids that wound around her head in a circlet.

“Why do you want to know?” She asked supiciously. 

“I found this rememberall,” Harry explained. “It’s Neville Longbottom’s. I think that he’s in the Gryffindor common room, so I was hoping to give it to a Gryffindor outside of their or something, so that they could give it back to him.” 

“Are you sure you didn’t take it from him?” She asked, eying him and his green tie distrustfully. 

“It wasn’t me,” Harry protested. “I swear. It was Draco Malfoy. I just happened to pick it up, and now I’m trying to give it back to him.” 

The scarlet woman absently ran her fingers over her braided crown, biting one ruby red lip. Finally she nodded, even though she didn’t drop her scowl. “You’re already pretty close,” she admitted, “Just go down that hall, turn left, open the door, climb the stairs, go down the hall and take the red door, and then go down those stairs.” 

“Down the hall, turn left, open the door, up the stairs, down the hall to the red door?” Harry asked. 

The scarlet woman nodded firmly. “Yes.” 

Harry looked at her for a moment, trying to figure out if she was lying. Something about her manner was a little bit off- but maybe it was a glitch in the portrait. Harry shrugged. “Thank you for the help, Miss.” He nodded and then headed down the hall. 

The first set of stairs was strange. It was cramped and rickety, and stuck inbetween two very close walls, unlike most of the moving staircases they had to use to get to various classes. At some points, the climb got so steep, the stairs were practically a ladder! It was also a pretty long climb. Harry must have rose two stories. When Harry went down the hall, he took the red door, and then went down the stairs. These stairs seemed to be about half the height of the first set, and went down instead of up. They were also wider, and less steep. 

When Harry got off, he found himself in a wide, yet dusty hall. He wasn’t sure yet whether or not the Gryffindor common room was around anywhere, so he started trying doors. One door let him into a room full of trophies; another let him into another, dimmer, slimmer hall; the papering was a pretty, if faded red, so Harry thought he might be getting closer. Harry went on down it until he saw a door opened partially; someone inside was talking. 

“Hagrid?” Harry asked in surprise, stepping inside. 

The gigantic man was gently petting one of the heads of a three-headed dog. The other two heads were happily devouring raw slabs of meat. As soon as Harry stepped inside, all three heads lifted; the dog lept towards him, growling angrily. 

“Shhhh, Fluffy,” Hagrid said. “It’s jus’ Harry.” But “Fluffy” wouldn’t “sshhh”, so Hagrid began whistling at him. Fluffy promptly went to sleep. Hagrid turned to Harry, and asked a little angrily, “Whata yeh doin’ here?”

“I- Gryffindor common room- Neville-” Harry shoved out the hand wrapped around Neville’s rememberall in explanation. “The portrait- said- told me to go-” Harry broke off, staring at the three headed dog. 

Hagrid sighed. “Look, I’m sorry, I shouldna gotten mad at yeh, but look here, Harry, this is the third floor corridor. Yer trespassin’. Dumbledore’s orders, see? Jus’ give me a moment, and I’ll show yeh ter the Gryffindor common room.” 

“Alright. Thank you,” Harry said, still staring at the three headed dog. It appeared to be curled up over a trap door. As Harry followed Hagrid out, he couldn’t help but wonder what the dog was trying to keep the students from. Maybe it had something to do with the package?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before I wrote this, I was going to have Harry confront Malfoy like in canon, but as I wrote, I realized that just wasn't in character for a Harry who's cultivating his Slytherin traits instead of his Gryffindor ones. He still supports his friends, just not always the way he does in canon.


	8. all tricks no treats

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Halloweens go, Harry's is incredibly terrible.

Time passed quickly. Harry told Hermione, Padma, Parvati, Ron, and Neville about the dog in the third floor corridor. Ron thought the entire thing sounded pretty cool, like a nice adventure, whereas Hermione thought this would be a terrible idea. Neville and Parvati found the idea of a three headed dog pretty disturbing, but Padma was mostly curious about what it could be guarding. 

When Harry wasn’t in class, he spent most of his time studying; he, Padma, Hermione and Neville turned out to be a pretty good team. Hermione had a good memory, Neville had an honestly amazing knowledge of Herbology, and Padma turned out to be very good with potions and History of Magic. Parvati spent more time with her friend, Lavender Brown, than studying with them, but sometimes she would come, and Ron sometimes showed up in desperate need of help on this or that assignment. Blaise Zabini had also come to study with them once, but he barely agknowledged Hermione, and didn’t come back after that one study session. 

More often than not, studying would devolve into whispered conversations and passed notes or doodles. Harry often smuggled Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk into the library under his robes, and often Hermione would argue with Harry over this or that. Harry would try to teach Padma how to say things in Parseltongue, but not often, as this seemed to make Neville oddly nervous, though he never said anything. Once, Harry did this when Ron was there, and he went pale as a sheet, flinched away, and wouldn’t talk to Harry for a week and a half. Finally, Parvati, who had happened to see the entire thing, marched up and demanded a conversation with him, and after that, Ron didn’t seem nearly as nervous at all. 

Parvati, it turned out, was a brilliant artist. Whenever she hung out with them, she would doodle little comics about the material instead of taking notes normally. Neville evidently really liked these comics, as he would always ask, blushing, to borrow them, even though he took his own notes.

Harry was really grateful for these friends, because Malfoy was really pretty nasty to him. One time, Malfoy tried to grab Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, but Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk just hissed warningly and showed her fangs, and Malfoy leapt aside with a squeak. Malfoy stole his glasses another time, and kept them for a whole week, so that Harry had to stumble through class and just pretend that he had lost them. When he saw them carelessly left on Malfoy’s dresser, he grabbed them back and resolved to keep Malfoy to keep from ever getting his pale hands on them again. Zabini seemed sympathetic to Harry; but he didn’t help Harry, which Harry took to meant, if Harry wanted to be friends with Zabini, he had to prove himself to be stronger than Malfoy. 

Seemingly without any time at all passing, two months had passed since Harry had arrived at Hogwarts. Lessons were getting more and more interesting, but the headaches Harry would get around Professor Quirrel were getting worse and worse. It was getting so bad, that Harry barely heard a word anyone said in that class. He had relearn most of it by way of the help from the people in his study group; when he mentioned the awful headaches to them, all anyone would say was suggest he go to the hospital wing. Harry quickly stopped talking about it. He was still painfully skinny, even with two months of good food. He was sure if he went to the hospital wing, it would get out somehow, and everyone in Slytherin would have even less respect for him than they did now. 

On Halloween day, Harry got a particularly bad headache. He stumbled out of the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, feeling and probably looking like a zombie. 

“Are you okay, Potter?” Tracey Davis asked him. 

Zabini grabbed Davis’ arm and pulled her away, murmering, “How do you THINK he is doing, considering it’s the anniversary of his parents’ de-” He glanced at Harry and quickly shut up.

Oh. Harry felt it like a punch to the gut, or maybe to the heart. His parents had died on Halloween. The words kept on bouncing around in his head, all throughout the rest of the day. When it was time to study, everyone else was excited over the feast- Parvati kept on doodling pumpkins and bats and candles and things all over her Charms notes, Ron was cheerfully chattering on about what kind of food there would be, and Padma was talking about holidays in India with a curious Hermione. Harry, on the other hand, dreaded it. Seeing everyone else’s happiness sounded awful. 

When everyone else left for the feast, Harry waved them off, saying, “I’m not really hungry. I’ll see you guys tomorrow, okay?” 

For once, Hermione just let him be, instead of bugging him about needing to eat more. After his friends left, Harry sat at the empty table for a while, not wanting to go to the empty Slytherin common room, not wanting to stay there either. Finally he shoved his notes into his messenger bag with a sigh. In the common room he could talk to Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, who would probably try to comfort him by threatening to hurt Malfoy or something equally ridiculous (and cute in a bloody sort of way) and here, he was completely alone. 

Harry sighed and slung his messenger bag over one shoulder. He took his time tucking in his chair, and then began to slowly walk towards the Slytherin common room. He was stopping to admire a really stunning portrait of a strange, terrifyingly alien mermaid who was still incredibly beautiful, when he smelt something really nasty- like a mixture of old socks and the kind of public toilet no one seems to clean.

And then Harry heard it -- a low grunting, and the shuffling footfalls of gigantic feet. Harry felt an instinctive fear, and he ducked into the nearest off-shoot from the main corridor- it turned out to go into a boy’s bathroom. If the troll joined him, he’d be trapped. Harry felt the urge to cower away, but he knew from experience that did no good if someone was coming to beat you up, so instead he pulled out his wand- little good that it could do- and bounced on his heels as he waited. 

The shuffling footfalls came closer. There was a moment’s pause, and then it came in. Harry stared in horror as it lumbered inside. It was a horrible sight. Twelve feet tall, its skin was a dull, granite gray, its great lumpy body like a boulder. It was holding a huge wooden club, which dragged along the floor because its arms were so long. 

The ugly thing started towards him, knocking the sinks off the walls as it went. Harry was holding his wand so tightly in his hand, he could barely feel his fingers. He was tense with terror. This wasn’t like with Dudley, the way to go wasn’t just to relax so that it hurt less and take the pain, this thing might very well eat Harry, or something equally awful and incurable. 

Harry still had a little time before the troll got right up to him; come on, come on, what spells could he use? The first one that came to mind was the severing charm, which Hermione had tried to teach them all. “Diffingo!” Harry yelled, swishing his wand furiously, but nothing happened. “Diffindio!” Harry tried this time. He was running out of time. Maybe a different spell? 

“Wingardium Leviosa!” Harry tried. This time, it worked. A sink lifted, and with a flick of the wand, Harry tried to direct it to whack into the troll, but the sink hit the wall behind the troll instead, and bounced off, still floating. The troll seemed confused and interested in the floating sink, however, which gave Harry a moment to try to sprint past. The troll turned back before Harry got past, and Harry ducked down between the troll’s legs, then shuffled to his feet and sprinted out of the bathroom at top speed on trembling legs. 

Harry hurdled blindly down the corridor, not daring to waste time looking back behind him. He could still hear the slow, stumbling footsteps. The staircases- if he could get onto a moving staircase, he could leave the troll behind. Harry raced down the corridors, the giant open space with the moving staircases should be soon, if he knew the way correctly- thank God, he was right. One of the moving staircases was just disconnecting; Harry started sprinting along it, hoping to get safely to the other side, but it disconnected before Harry could do that. 

Harry glanced over his shoulder. The troll was only a few minutes away. He didn’t have time to wait for the next one. There was another staircase passing under this one- before Harry could agknowledge what a tremendously awful idea this was, Harry had leapt down to the staircase below. In the split second as he fell, he swore he heard Professor Snape yell “POTTER!” in an outraged bellow. 

All his weight went to his feet all at once, and Harry felt an immeadiate throbbing pain in his ankles. When he tried to stand, tumbled back to his knees almost at once. 

“WAIT THERE, POTTER,” someone yelled down. Harry looked up and saw that Professor McGonagall, Professor Snape, and Professor Quirrel were all in a staircase above him. They seemed to be approaching the troll. Harry turned quickly away. There was a nasty noise of tearing flesh, and when Harry glanced up, he saw that Professor Snape had just swiped his wand viciously, slicing the troll open and spewing blood everywhere. Harry felt bile rise in his throat, and suddenly he was throwing up, leaning over so he wouldn’t dirty his robes. He could feel tears streak down his cheeks and he was shaking uncontrollably. 

“Mr. Potter! What on earth were you thinking? You’re lucky you weren’t killed. Why aren’t you in your dormitory?” Harry could hear three steps of footsteps approaching and quickly swiped at his cheeks to wipe away his tears. 

“I- I’m sorry,” Harry mumbled, looking at the ground, utterly and completely confused. “Why was there a- a troll in the-” 

“Get up, Potter,” came Snape’s harsh voice. With a disgusted little curl of his lips and a flick of his wand, the vomit was gone. “Get up.”

Harry managed to get to his feet, wincing as he stumbled over to the railing. He held on to it with a death grip to try to alleviate the pain in his feet. 

“Now. Explain.” 

“I- I um,” Harry sucked in a rattling breath, “I didn’t go to the Halloween feast. I was in the library, but then my friends left for- and I didn’t, because- anyway I didn't go to the feast, and then I was going to go to the common room- but I- I smelled the... the ” Harry’s hands were starting to shake a little, and it was hard to articulate the smell, so he just shook his head and moved on. “I ran into a bathroom, but, then, uh, it was a dead end, so then I tried a cutting curse, but it didn’t work, so I distracted it and sprinted to the staircases- I jumped so it wouldn’t follow me, and uh, here we are,” he finished lamely.

“I see, Mr. Potter,” Professor McGonagall said, letting out a breath. “My apologies.” She looked rattled, her face paler than even when she had faced down the troll. 

“Fifteen points will be given to Slytherin,” Professor Snape slid in smoothly. He was looking right at Professor McGonagall as he said, “For self preservation and common sense.” 

“Thank you, sir,” Harry mumbled. He knew Professor Snape was just doing it to annoy McGonagall, but still. 

“Mr. Potter, you appear to have injured yourself,” Professor Snape continued smoothly. “Professor McGonagall will accompany you to the hospital wing.” 

“It’s fine,” Harry said, forcing himself to let go of the rail. “See? I’m all fine. I’d really rather just go to bed, you know.” 

“Mr. Potter,” Professor McGonagall began, but Professor Snape cut her off. “Come along, Potter.” He grabbed Harry’s arm, and Harry only had time to quickly grab up his messenger bag again before they were off. 

Professor Snape took huge strides that left Harry half-jogging to keep up on his painful feet. They reached the Hospital Wing quite quickly. Professor Snape strode in, robes billowing. 

“Poppy? Potter has injured himself- his feet, it appears, although perhaps those are not his only injury.” Snape managed to make the entire thing sound terribly insulting, like it was Harry’s fault he’d managed to accidently hurt himself. Harry figured Snape was disappointed the troll hadn’t gone and all out killed him. 

Madame Pompfrey pointed Harry to a small cot. “Where does it hurt?” she asked gently. “Just the feet, or did something else come up?” 

“Um. My feet. My arm, too.” He rolled up his sleeve, revealing a scrape along the length of his arm. From what, he didn’t know. The adrenaline had made him feel barely any of the pain. 

Madame Pompfrey waved her wand so that Harry’s feet glowed a little, and bright text in the air next to them listed things for her to read. She tutted a moment, then flicked her wand again, and then the light turned green and disappeared, and Harry’s feet completely stopped hurting. 

“Aguamenti.” Water spurted out of her wand in a gentle spray of water that washed off Harry’s scrape. She used another spell, and the dirt disappeared, leaving Harry’s scrape stinging but completely clean. Another twirl of her wand, and a long cloth bandage covered his scrap, sticking to the skin around it. 

“There you go. Now, off to bed you go,” She said, smiling cheerfully down at him. 

“Now that wasn’t too bad was it?” Professor Snape said the normally comforting phrase in a cutting, sarcastic voice that made Harry surpress a hint of a flinch. 

“Yessir,” Harry murmured, following a half-step behind Professor Snape to the common room. 

Madame Pompfrey wrote up a brief report, and was tucking it into Harry’s section, when she noticed something a little bit surprising and disturbing. Harry’s section held reports of his birth, of the potions to make him immune to various magical diseases, but nothing after that. No muggle medical records at all. 

Madame Pomfrey shook her head in confusion. Maybe his aunt and uncle had forgotten, or had been uncertain how to use owl post. She decided she would deal with it in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “I heard he took down that troll Quirrel was so worried about, even though he’s just a firstie.” 
> 
> “You see that bandage he’s got on his arm now? That’s where the troll was chewing on it.” 
> 
> “Yeah, well I heard that he jumped off a moving staircase onto another just like, you know. Parkour! Wait, you don’t know what parkour is? Seriously, you purebloods are missing out on so much-” 
> 
> Harry walked into the Great Hall for lunch with his head down. Whispers had been following him around all day. 
> 
> “HARRY!” Hermione sprinted up and hugged him. “I was so worried! I heard you got hurt by a troll- I’m so, so, SO glad you’re okay.” 
> 
> Harry tensed a little at the unexpected contact, then relaxed and even hugged her back, a little. “Thanks,” he said. “It wasn’t really that bad.” 
> 
> “Wasn’t that bad? A troll, of all things!” Hermione dragged Harry to the Ravenclaw table, still chattering.


	9. red and green

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry Potter is surprised to get presents, but is even more surprised by what exactly he gets. One present in particular is extra interesting.

November passed quickly, in a whir of studying and goofing off in the library. Parvati bugged Hermione one too many times about trying new hair styles and they had a big fight, and then made up. Following this, Parvati finally was allowed to try doing Hermione’s hair, and Hermione decided she actually kind of liked it. Harry went to the Quidditch match and clapped with the other Slytherins, so fast and thick they sounded like thunder, as Terence Higgs swiped the snitch. I should try out for Seeker next year, that looks fun, Harry thought to himself. 

Soon, it was December, and Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk went into brumation. One morning, it even snowed, and two of Ron’s brothers pulled a hilarious prank where a couple of snowballs kept on whacking Professor Quirrel over and over in the turban. Even the Slytherins, who generally tried to be reserved in public, were in knots over it. 

When Professor Snape put up a list to sign up to stay over the break, Harry signed up at once. He was the first and only first year Slytherin to do so; there was only two other people from Slytherin staying over, a very antisocial third year and, unbelievably, an even more antisocial fifth year. 

Draco Malfoy kept on taunting him about it in the common room, but Harry pretended the blond didn’t even exist. 

Of his friends, no one was staying at school except for him, and Ron Weasley. Harry didn’t feel like he knew Ron very well, as Ron was closer to Neville than he was to Harry, but Ron seemed nice enough, from Harry’s experience of him, and Harry would be glad for the company. 

Therefore, Harry spent most of his time in the Gryffindor common room, which seemed alright, if rather saturated with reds and other warm colors. Ron and his brothers seemed nice enough. Ron seemed to be kind of annoyed about his parents not taking him and his brothers on vacation with them, so Harry told them a little bit about his family, which made Ron perk up at once. 

Ron even tried to teach him wizard chess, which it turned out Harry was quite bad at. None of his pieces trusted him at all. Still, it could be kind of fun. 

On Christmas Eve, Harry went to bed not expecting any presents at all. When he woke the next morning, however, the first thing he saw was a surprisingly large pile of packages at the foot of his bed. 

Harry rolled out of bed, straightening his pajamas and pulling on his bathrobe. Harry couldn't help but grin a little, looking at his presents in delight and surprise. 

Harry opened up the first parcel, which turned out to be from Parvati. It was wrapped in brightly colored, slightly sparkly paper, and tied with a thick ribbon. Inside was a small bottle of something that was dark green and smelt like mint. “SLEAKEAZY’S!” the label proclaimed cheerily. Harry laughed. 

Harry picked up the next parcel. Inside was a roughly cut wooden flute, that Hagrid had obviously whittled himself. Harry blew it -- it sounded a bit like an owl. Harry carefully repacked it, then moved onto the next present. 

It was a messily wrapped book on how to identify, use, and care for various potions ingredients from Neville. Harry flipped through it quickly- it looked very useful. 

Hermione had given him the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy, all hardcover. Harry stared at it in awe, completely blown out of the water in awe and delight. He’d not even dared to expect presents, let alone an entire trilogy. He resolved to let Hermione give him more of those hugs she liked so much and Harry didn’t care for, himself, or do something similar to thank her. 

One, other, larger present, which was from Padma and Parvati together, revealed itself to be a big, warm terrarium with heated rocks, and plants, and dirt, and a little container for food. “Wow,” Harry breathed. He was glad, now, he’d put as much time into their presents as he had- he’d given Parvati a muggle book which explained how to draw anatomy and perspective as well as a set of earrings, and Padma, a book on the moon landing, and a pretty new quill. 

Ron, it turned out, had given him a somewhat worn-looking book on Quidditch that looked quite interesting. 

There were a few last presents. One was a very small parcel which contained a note. “We received your message and enclose your Christmas present. From Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia.” Taped to the note was a fifty-pence piece. 

At least it’s not a coat hanger or an old sock, Harry thought to himself. This at least was theoretically slightly useful. 

There were two more presents left. One of them was wrapped in bright, cheery red paper with a slightly mussed green ribbon. He tore open the parcel to reveal a large box of homemade fudge. The fudge was very good, and Harry couldn’t help wondering who it was from. 

The last parcel was wrapped in waxy, pale blue paper, and had a silver ribbon tied into an elegant bow at the top. It was very light. Harry unwrapped it, careful of the nice wrapping paper. Something fluid and silvery gray went slithering to the floor, where it lay in softly gleaming folds, a little bit like moonlight. Harry ran his fingers and found that it was all silky and soft, tightly woven yet cool to the touch at the same time, sort of like water running over your fingers. 

Harry held it up to get a better look at it. It looked to be about as tall as a full-grown adult. There was a hood, and then the long cloak portion, he saw. Just below the hood, in the place there would have been a tag, there was a symbol in dark red thread, which formed a triangle, with a thin line bisecting it, and a circle inside of the triangle, also bisected by the line. Aside from the odd symbol, there wasn't any sort of tag or marking on it anywhere. 

Harry walked to the mirror and threw the cloak around his shoulders. The cloak was so light you could hardly feel it- but you could see a difference. His reflection looked back at him, just his head suspended in midair, and when Harry threw the hood over his head, even that vanished. Harry stared, completely dumbstruck. He was invisible. It was like he had just disappeared- stopped existing. 

It was a little creepy not to be able to see yourself in the mirror, so Harry took the cloak off. As he did so, a note, written on fancy stationary, fell out. 

The note read, “Your father left this in my possession before he died. It is time it was returned to you. Use it well. A Very Merry Christmas to you.” 

There was no signature; the only sign of who it was the narrow, elegant cursive it was written it. 

Harry ran his fingers over the cloak again, trying spreading it over a couch- which made it look like there was a huge hole in the couch- over his pile of presents, over his arm again. It completely defied logic- he knew it was magic, but still. 

It was almost time for lunch, by now, and Harry wanted to ask the Weasleys about this newest strange, magical thing. Harry didn’t particularly feel like showing anyone else but them. Luckily, he found that the cloak crumpled to an incredibly small size- it was as if it had no mass of its own. The entire cloak could fit into his robes’ pocket with loads of room to spare.

Because there were so few student staying for Christmas break, they were eating up at the High Table with the teachers. The Christmas lunch was very good, though somewhat worse for the fact that Snape, and for that matter Dumbledore as well, who Harry still didn’t trust, were sitting at the same table as him. There were mountains and mountains of food- huge juicy turkeys and thick, creamy mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce so flavorful and thick it made the stuff Aunt Petunia used to make seem like diluted fruit juice, rich gravy, and little hills of wizard crackers here and there along the table. 

Wizard crackers were incredible. Some of them released music, or the sound of a blast like a cannon, or clouds that were sparkly or brightly colored, some of which smelt like lemons, others like expensive perfume, or cinnamon. Some contained colorful spark creation kits, or moving Quidditch posters, weird, funny hats, little bouquets of flowers, or confetti with jokes written on them. 

Professor Flitwick began reading out a bunch of these jokes with delight, and Dumbledore, wearing a tall bonnet covered in a wreath of roses, daffodils and calla lilies, paid close attention. Even Snape seemed to relax a little, his scowl mostly gone, though Harry still avoided looking at him for too long, for fear Snape would get mad at him for staring. 

Harry left the table carrying a map of the stars that moved to show their new positions through the seasons, and a pretty glass ball that changed to different colors depending on the mood of the person who held it. 

That afternoon was spent fighting furiously, trying to get back at Fred and George for mercilessly pumelling them with snowballs. Harry and Ron were originally on the same side, but then Harry got bored of losing to Fred and George, so Harry and Ron faced off instead, only for Fred and George to join in again and back Harry up. Then they all went after Percy for not playing in the first place. 

Finally, tired, they all collapsed on the snow. Conversation wandered to talking about their favorite presents, and Harry recalled what he had tucked in his robes’ pocket. 

“I got the weirdest anonymous present,” Harry said during a lull in the conversation. “It’s really soft, but like….” 

Ron turned red and pressed in his face into his hands. Fred and George grinned. “He really is a member of the family now, like it or not!” Fred said. 

“What color?” George asked. 

“Um. It’s kind of silvery?” Harry said in complete confusion. “Do you guys have one too?” 

“Haven’t you seen our new sweaters?” Fred asked, standing and twirling to show off his blue sweater, with a large yellow F on the front of it. 

“The height of fashion,” George agreed sardonically, but the truth was, Harry felt a little jealous as he looked at the warm, homemade sweater. Aunt Petunia would spend her time making something like that for him when the pork she was going to make for dinner upped and flew. “Mum makes them for us every Christmas.” 

“That’s- that’s not what I got. Though, I think your mum may have made me fudge.” After a slight hesitation, Harry pulled out his cloak and swooped it over his shoulders. 

“Would you look at that,” Fred said, coming suddenly to a halt in his bounding. “Could that be-” 

“George, I do think that it is,” George said staring in awe. 

“An invisibility cloak?” They said together. 

“Yeah,” Ron said, still staring at the silvery stuff in awe. “Yeah, it’s an invisibility cloak.” 

“Now Harry, dear Harry Harrikins,” Fred began in a wheedling tone. 

“-how you would you feel about renting that cloak out to us?” 

“We may not be rich in gold,” Fred said solemnly, “but we do have a very good knowledge of the castle.” 

“Like to know where the kitchens are? Like to know how to get to Potions from the Great Hall in half the time?” George wiggled his eyebrows conspiringly. 

“All you’d have to do is let us borrow that cloak maybe once, twice…” 

“There are so many secrets in this castle, and we could tell you all of them.” 

“If you would just see about letting us rent out that cloak,” Fred finished, nodding convincingly. 

“Maybe,” Harry said, running his fingers over the strange texture of the cloak. “I think I might like to try it out on my own first, but I’ll get back to you on it.” 

“Of course,” the twins said together, nodding very solemnly. “We shan’t bother you about it until then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Harry doesn't get a sweater because I don't think they're quite close enough for it to be in-character for Molly to make him one, but they'll get closer over time. 
> 
> The "red thread" is actually dried thestral blood. 
> 
> Giving a Slytherin an invisibility cloak is like giving a mouse a cookie. Harry will do many interesting and rule-break-y things with said cloak, I can tell you that. 
> 
> Also- thank you so much for 200 kudos! It's really heartwarming knowing that 224 people like my fic, especially since recently I've been pretty stressed out. Editing this chapter was me procrastinating on all the words I need to write for Camp Nanowrimo, so.


	10. reflections are backwards, remember?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry uses his new invisibility cloak for his first bit of rule breaking, and finds a mirror that doesn't work right.

The sweets sat unpleasantly on Harry’s stomach that night, twisting it and leaving a dull ache. The room was too cold and empty, with Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk in brumation, and all the other boys away. The covers weren’t quite enough, in the dungeon’s chill, and Harry curled up, shivered a little as he fell half asleep. 

Harry was in the boy’s bathroom that had been destroyed. The door was locked and the sinks were knocked from the walls. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, longer and larger and cold as ice, wrapped around his neck, moving slowly, tightening as she whispered a long low hiss of warming. “It’sss coming, it’sss coming, it’sss coming… beware, Harry… ” 

There were rhythmic footsteps now, coming closer and closer, and Harry shivered and pulled his blankets closer at the chill they brought with them. It smelled of unwashed bathrooms and gym socks, and garlic. Harry’s head was aching like it always did in the stuffy Defense classroom, stabbing pains near his scar, with an underlying long dull ache. 

The door opened and Harry saw it was only Hagrid, beetle black eyes sparkling and carrying a cake with “Happy Birthday, Harry!” written on it in green frosting.

Aunt Petunia didn’t like this. “Green and brown? That doesn’t go together at all- and think of all the calories!” 

“Now, Dudley,” Uncle Vernon said, frowning down at Dudley, who had a pig’s nose, “Don’t eat a bite of that, it’s probably poisoned!” 

“As if the boy- or the groundskeeper- has near enough competency to brew poison,” Professor Snape snapped, then sneered at the messy writing on the cake. 

“Perhaps it is a little messy,” Professor Dumbledore allowed, waving his wand with a twinkling eye. The lettering turned and spelled instead, in emerald green frosting, “Mr. Harry Potter, the Cupboard Under the Stairs.” 

“Much better,” Professor Snape said, sneering at Harry cruelly. “Now, wash that cauldron!” 

Harry placed the cauldron in the sink, but it was broken off from the pipes, and he didn’t have water to wash it with. 

“How incompetent,” Professor Snape sneered, shaking his greasy-haired head. He upended an entire container of bleach into the cauldron. Harry put his hands in to wash it, and found his hands prickling as if with frostbite or as if they were set on fire. He saw Aunt Petunia nodding with satisfaction in the corner. “And clean up this bathroom too,” She added, curling up the tip of her nose. 

Harry pulled his cold hands in under the blankets and turned over, trying to get more comfortable. 

Harry was sitting at the table at Privet Drive now, with Professor Dumbledore across from him, wearing Aunt Petunia’s favorite sweater. 

“I need money for lunch. It’s not part of the school’s budget anymore, and I need lunch, otherwise I won’t be able to do my chores,” Harry said. Professor Dumbledore just looked at him, eyes twinkling. 

“I don’t need lunch,” Harry corrected himself in a murmur. "Two meals a day is enough, and it was greedy to ask for a third, unnecessary meal. I'm sorry." 

“Finally, boy,” Uncle Vernon said. “Hogwarts doesn’t pay for your lunches, and I won’t either.” Uncle Vernon grinned and his teeth sharpened to points. There was a smell of troll in the air, and it was growing cold, the walls shrinking in, turning the shade of off white that was the color of his cupboard. “In fact, we won’t pay for anything.” 

Harry hurried out of his cupboard, Dumbledore’s twinkle-eyed gaze following him. But outside of the cupboard, the house had been replaced with tall white bars, like pillars. The walls outside of the pillars were red, just a few shades off from the shade of blood. 

There were footsteps and an explosion, and the red walls were gone, obliterated, to reveal the cold and darkness of a starless night. Harry could hear now a frantic voice, a woman’s. And now, there was high laughter and a screaming, screaming voice, the high cold laughter and the gut-churning scream merging into one horrible sound, and vividly bright green, green, filling Harry’s vision-

Above Harry the green curtains hung limply. Harry rolled out of bed, panting almost frantically, yanking in deep breaths. He was feverish with energy. He needed to move. He had that dream very rarely, once every few years, but when he did have it, he could never get back to sleep afterwards.

Harry grabbed his cloak, threw it over his shoulders. The cool fabric seemed to calm him down a little, still the feverish energy rising within him. His fingers happened to close around Hagrid’s flute, which was on his dresser where he had absently left it, and he decided to bring it with him, finding the weight of it kind of comforting. 

Harry wandered through the dungeons for only a short time; they were really cold, and he had only socks and pajamas on, under the invisibility cloak. Instead, he climbed up into the regular castle, then headed to the staircases. 

It was the eeriest thing. The staircases were all completely static, hanging in the air, unmoving. When Harry stepped on to a staircase, it gave a little shudder, and slowly, the staircase rotated out into the center, even as all the others stayed static. Harry moved slowly, holding onto the railing; when he looked down below, the crunch of his ankles as he hit the staircase below, the smell of the troll, Professor Snape’s angry bellow, all seemed to fill his head. 

Harry exited across, and began to wander farther. He wasn’t sure where he was going, until he saw the antlered woman, leaning her head against a tree, her blood red lips moving softly as she snored gently. 

It took Harry a long time to remember the rest of the way, and when he reached the door, it was locked. He shook the door and tried to pry it open with his wand, but it wouldn’t open.

The noise of Harry trying to pry his way in must have woke Fluffy, because Fluffy started to bark against the door, snuffling and sniffing angrily. For a moment Harry stood frozen in shock, but then he remembered Hagrid lulling Fluffy to sleep, and pulled the flute out, beginning to blow into it. He was still blowing when he heard two sets of footsteps. 

“-sure I heard music,” came Professor Snape’s tart voice, as he rounded the corner, robes billowing back dramatically, face pale as a vampire’s in the dim light. 

“I heard it too,” Mr. Filch agreed, Mrs. Norris’ raggedy body held in his arms, right up next to his chest. “We should check the Stone.” 

Harry flattened himself against the wall, sure he was going to die. Professor Snape would grind him into potions ingredients, but not before beating him to a pulp, and lecturing him to the point where Harry’s ears fell off. 

But neither Professor Snape nor Mr. Filch saw him, because even if Harry had forgotten about his cloak, didn’t mean it wasn’t working. Instead of lecturing the invisible Harry, Professor Snape pressed his wand to the door, murmuring, “Alohomora.” The door opened, and Mr. Filch and Professor Snape stepped inside. Harry followed them in before he could think. 

Fluffy was dozing on the floor, but when Mr. Filch and Professor Snape entered, he woke up, and began to growl, coming at them angrily. 

When Fluffy got up, Harry saw that the three headed dog was actually standing on a trap door, with a big metal ring in the middle, to lift it up with. 

That thing Mr. Filch had been talking about, the stone or whatever, must be under it somewhere. 

While Mr. Filch and Professor Snape had their backs turned, Harry slipped out the door. Heart pounding with adrenaline, he tip-toe ran down corridors, up and down staircases, getting himself thoroughly lost, but also far from the certain doom that was the terrible combination of Mr. Filch and Professor Snape. 

Finally, Harry ducked off into an abandoned classroom. It looked pretty boring- the only interesting thing was an old mirror, right in the center of the room. 

Harry moved to step in front of the mirror, and gaped in surprise at what he saw. He could see himself, in his pajamas with rumpled hair, perfectly clear despite the invisibility cloak covering him. Behind him, he could see tons of older people, stuffed into the mirror, but when he turned around, he was all alone- unless they were wearing invisibility cloaks of their own? 

Standing directly behind Harry were two young adults, who looked about twenty. There was a beautiful woman, with laughing, green eyes, curly vividly red hair, pale skin and a smattering of freckles. One of her slender, elegant long hands rested on mirror-Harry’s shoulder in a protective, gentle sort of touch. She was looking right at Harry, and as she smiled, tears ran down her face. 

Standing beside her, and leaning in now to press a kiss to the woman’s cheek, his hand on mirror-Harry’s other shoulder, was a man. He had slightly darker skin than Harry, and Harry’s wild messy black hair. He had the most brilliant, bright grin of anyone Harry had ever seen. His head turned away from the woman, and he made eye contact with Harry- his eyes glittered with emotion, behind circular lenses just like Harry’s. Harry knew instinctively he was James Potter, and the woman Lily Potter. 

Standing next to James Potter, one arm casually thrown over his shoulder, was a man with a playful smirk, wearing a leather jacket, with his long black hair tied up and back. As Harry watched, he leaned in and mussed up mirror-Harry’s already messy hair, and mirror-Harry laughed cheerfully, grinning up at him, mouthing something in what must have been playful indignation. 

Standing on the other side of the group, next to Lily Evans, was a lanky, tall man, covered in scars but with bright eyes and the nicest smile lines crinkling around his eyes. A big, worn, loose-woven sweater hung around him, and he wore the sort of high-waisted jeans that had been so fashionable in the eighties. A couple of old books were tucked under one arm, and he was sipping a cup of tea. As Harry watched, he looked up and gave a little wave, and a gentle smile. 

Behind them were yet more people- behind Lily Evans, an older woman with green eyes and curly white hair, along with a thin man with blonde hair and green eyes, and a few others. Behind Harry’s father was a variety of people, including a very elderly looking man with skin almost twice as dark as Harry’s, with knobbly knees and his nose, and a woman wearing vividly colored robes and gorgeous bangles almost up to her elbows. The woman was holding the hand of another man, this one with warm hazel eyes, pale skin that was the kind of translucent of old people, and the same smile as Harry and his father. 

Harry could feel a powerful ache, a mixture of pain and bliss, happiness and sadness so strong it hurt, twisting in his chest, that made it very difficult to speak. 

Harry dropped to his knees. The man in the mirror with the sweater was smiling a little sadly, and dropping to his knees as well, offering mirror-Harry a piece of chocolate. Harry’s father dropped to his knees also, wrapping mirror-Harry in a hug, and the leather jacket man shrugged off his jacket, swinging it onto the shoulders of mirror-Harry. Harry’s mother was saying something to him, looking right through the mirror at him. She was still crying. 

Harry crawled closer. He almost could understand what his mum was saying, now. 

“Mum… Dad…” Harry whispered words he had never had anyone to address with, pressing his hands to the mirror as though he could reach through and pull them out. 

Harry began to sob, deep, quiet sobs that rattled out of the center of him, where that powerful ache of sadness and happiness was. His entire body shook, and even as his eyes overflowed with tears, he couldn’t help but stare into the mirror. 

In the mirror, his mother’s eyes were sparkling with worry. His father and the sweater wearing man were pulling him into a group hug, and the man with the gray eyes and leather jacket was rubbing his back, appearing to be speaking soothingly. 

Outside the mirror, Harry had no one to comfort him, and he cried and cried until finally, at long last, he had run all out of tears, and he fell asleep, lulled by the gazes of his family, stuck in the mirror. 

When he woke the next morning they were still there. Lily Evans’ mum offered mirror-Harry a plate of pancakes, piled high, with bacon on the side, and the man with the sweater handed mirror-Harry a cup of hot chocolate. They all sat down in chairs they pulled from beyond the borders of the mirror and sat down, eating and chattering, mostly ignoring real Harry, but showering mirror-Harry with affection. 

Occasionally, one of them would look at Harry, and their eyes would get sad and tired, and they’ll said something to him, but Harry couldn’t hear them. He strained his ears hard in the morning quiet, but he only made them ring. 

Harry drowned his sense of time in a thousand little details. His father’s eyes crinkled when he laughed at a joke that the leather jacket man made. His mother held her fork elegantly, even cut her pancakes gracefully, but unlike Aunt Petunia, she didn’t eat like a bird. The bangled woman- Harry’s grandmother on his dad’s side, he thought- cleared the plates, and she carried them to a sink that the mirror’s field of vision seemed to have expanded to capture. There seemed to be some sort of friendly argument, and then, laughing sheepishly, the leather jacket man went to go wash the dishes. 

Harry’s mother started to brush her teeth. She used a muggle toothbrush just like his, and even a little plastic tube of toothpaste, but the others pulled out fiber brushes and little jars like the other Slytherins. Someone stuck a toothbrush in mirror-Harry’s mouth, and he started to brush. Lily fiddled a little with his hair, adjusting it. James laughed and mussed up his own hair, then made Harry’s hair even worse. 

Harry blinked and realized his cheeks were wet. There were tears streaming down them now, but in the mirror, Lily was growing worried as she brushed the tears off Harry’s cheeks, so Harry swallowed his tears, wanting to make his mom happy. He wasn’t quite sure why he was so very sad, anyway. He felt good. Unbearably happy. He’d been getting to see his parents. Why would he be sad? 

The family moved through their day. Harry followed his dad and the leather-jacket man out to a sunstained meadow. Harry easily mounted his broom, just as easily as he had in flying lessons, and the trio soared around, throwing around a ball, laughing and joking, Harry thought, though he still couldn’t hear them. 

Mum and both sets of grandparents started spectating, along with the sweater man, after a while. They both laughed and cheered, elbowing each other cheerfully. When Harry managed to make a particularly good catch, they all erupted into applause, Dad and the leather jacket man- his name was just on the tip of Harry’s tongue- whistled and gave him high fives. 

The group went in for lunch, and continued joking around cheerfully, Dad’s hair still windswept from flying. The sweater man read a particularly good bit from a book, and the table cracked up. 

The lunch looked delicious and Harry could feel his stomach growling, but the sweater man was stirring his tea- tea at lunch, the man was really an addict- in a particularly fascinating way, and his dad was grinning at Harry in a way that showed his rows of perfect white teeth, and also Grandma Evans was serving lemon cake, and it would be rude to leave now, don’t you think? 

After lunch, they went back outside for more quidditch. Dad was making a particularly fancy loop on his broom, when something surprised Harry out of his stupor. 

“...sure I saw his name here on the Map.” 

“He could be under his cloak.” 

“But he would have obviously said hi or something by now.” Fred glared around the room. “We’re friends, after all.” 

Harry made a little surprised noise. He didn’t know they were friends. 

“Ahaha!” George cried. 

“Don’t worry, we’ll leave your peace and quiet,” Fred said. 

“-Although I don’t get why you would want to hang out with a mirror that doesn’t even work,” George put in. 

“Just take care of yourself, okay?” 

The twins left at last, and Harry’s gaze returned to the mirror, but now that he had glanced away, something was niggling at him. He needed to pee. Really badly. He debated going or staying, desperately wanting to stay with his parents, but he figured needing to pee distracted him anyway, so he’d just go to the bathroom really quickly. 

He practically ran to the bathroom, pattering along quickly under the mirror. It took him far too long to find a bathroom, and as he hurriedly scrubbed his hands, he wondered what his parents were doing, hoped they understood, thought again and again and again of little details or each person in his family. It probably only took him thirty minutes to find a bathroom and do his business, but it felt like hours and hours. 

He all-out sprinted back to the mirror when he was done, plopping down. He grinned and waved back to his parents, who looked a little impatient and annoyed, but glad to see him back. 

"So, you, like hundreds before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror of Erised."

Harry whirled around so fast he almost got whiplash. Albus Dumbledore, complete with long white beard and flamboyant robes, was sitting on one of the desks by the wall. Harry must have walked straight past him, so desperate to get to the mirror he hadn't noticed him. Harry felt his heart pounding and his stomach starting to try to wiggle up through his throat.

" -- I, uh, didn't see you, s-sir,” Harry managed to choke out. 

"Strange how nearsighted being invisible can make you," said Dumbledore, but he was smiling. His smile dropping away a little, he nodded to the mirror. "I expect you've realized by now what it does?" 

Feeling a lot like he had when Snape had interrogated him, Harry uncertainly said, "It -- well -- it, um, it sh- shows me hanging out with my family -- but- well- they’re all- so I guess it shows alternate versions of reality? Like other possible things that could have happened?"

“A very good attempt, but not quite right,” Dumbledore said. Harry bristled internally at being condescended to, but luckily Dumbledore continued. "Let me explain. The happiest man on earth would be able to use the Mirror of Erised like a normal mirror, that is, he would look into it and see himself exactly as he is. Does that help?"

“It shows us what we want,” Harry said after a moment. 

"Yes and no. It shows us nothing more or less than the deepest, most desperate desire of our hearts. However, this mirror will give us neither knowledge or truth. Men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible." Dumbledore gave Harry a stern look over his round gold glasses, adding, “The mirror will be moved to a new home, Harry, and I ask you not to go looking for it again. If you ever do run across it, you will now be prepared.”

He added thoughtfully, “It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that... Now, why don’t you go off and find what those friends of yours are up to?" 

Harry stood up, sending one last longing look at the mirror. His parents were giving him similar pained looks, as though they knew he was leaving. Harry couldn’t see to quite tear his eyes away. 

“Harry,” Dumbledore said very gently. “Those are not your parents.” 

Harry swiveled back to look at Dumbledore, a look of pain and a little bit of anger searing across his face before he quickly wiped it. Dumbledore placed a hand on his shoulder and guided him out of the room. Just before Dumbledore closed the door, Harry impulsively thought of a question, one intended to sting and scrape beneath the polite veneer. "S-sir -- Professor Dumbledore? Can I ask you something?" Harry used his youngest sounding voice, allowing his nerves to seep through, just like he would when he wanted the librarian to protect him from Dudley. 

"Obviously, you've just done so," Dumbledore smiled. "You may ask me one more thing, however." 

"What do you see when you look in the mirror?" Harry asked. 

"I? I see myself holding a pair of thick, woolen socks. One can never have enough socks. Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn't get a single pair. People insist on giving me books." 

Harry nodded thoughtfully and tried to memorize Dumbledore’s face, figuring it might be useful in figuring out the man’s tells. Next time he said something suspicious, if he had this same expression, Harry would be able to assume Dumbledore was lying. 

Harry wondered if the eye-twinkling thing was a tell. Were the flamboyant robes to throw off suspicion? 

It had taken Harry a long time to learn Aunt Petunia’s tells, and Harry wouldn’t be near as close up to Dumbledore’s face with him up in the front of the Great Hall, but even have some sort of knowledge of Dumbledore’s tells would be helpful. Harry considered this quite thoroughly as he reluctantly returned to his common room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If it hurts you, it hurts me a little bit more to write it. 
> 
> I hope you guys like my version of the Mirror of Erised, and my depiction of what Harry's family would be like. You may notice some things about who is and is not there in the Mirror. You can probably guess who the tea addict and the leather jacket wearer are. 
> 
> In canon, the mirror knew what Harry's family looked like, even though Harry himself did not. I headcanon this mirror has some power of divination. It's also possible it's something similar to Tom Riddle's diary, and sucks life force from it's victim in return for pandering to their feelings. 
> 
> Dumbledore's not necessarily a bad guy, Harry just thinks he is. I plan on writing more on this dynamic with Professor Dumbledore in later chapters. 
> 
> Anyway, feel free to tell me what you think in the comments! Even if it's just yelling at me for making you sad, I love hearing from you guys.


	11. stones and spirals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A stand is taken. Harry is reminded that he is not alone.

Harry didn’t find the mirror again, but thoughts of the mirror took up many of his waking and sleeping hours that were otherwise unoccupied. He found himself reflecting on the tiny details he’d learnt from it, wondering about his parents, trying to figure out who the leather jacket man and the tea addict could be.

He started having nightmares, as well. Over and over again he dreamed about his parents disappearing in a flash of green light, while a high voice cackled with laughter. Sometimes the leather jacket man was there, too, gaping in shock over their limp, faceless bodies. The emerald and auburn and brown shades of his parents would bleed out onto the leather jacket man, and he would stare at the shades melting off of them and sob. 

Other times, Grandma Evans would face off the mountain troll in the stinking bathroom, or Professor Snape would take Grandma Potter down with sharp responses that left physical cuts all up and down her arms and face.

Harry didn’t tell anyone about the mirror, besides Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, who had finally woken from her brumation, and loved her new terrarium. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk didn't even come close to understanding it, but it was sort of nice just articulating what had happened. Harry cried onto his snake friend, and, confused, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk nuzzled Harry until he stopped leaking salt water.

When the others came back from vacation, they were all chattering about what they had done over vacation, so Harry told them all about how Mr. Filch and Professor Snape had talked about a stone of some sort. 

“It sounds… familiar,” Hermione said slowly. “But I don’t know. I feel like it’s just on the tip of my tongue.” 

“It might be something muggle, then,” Parvati offered up, “Because I haven’t heard of it anywhere.” 

“I dunno,” Padma said slowly. “It sounds a little familiar to me, too.” 

“Same,” Neville agreed. 

“I can research it,” Hermione offered. 

“Are you sure?” Harry asked. “I mean, the Gringotts thing didn’t make anything useful turn up…” 

“But I learnt a lot about Gringotts, and it was a ton of fun,” Hermione said. She started sprouting off facts about Gringotts, some of which were quite fascinating. 

Sure enough, Hermione soon started telling them about an obscure branch of magic involving imbuing crystals and other interesting stones with magic, and then releasing the magic later, like a time released spell. Apparently it was very complicated, and all the prototypes Hermione made failed, but she thought maybe it was partially because she had bad quality crystals. 

Other than Hermione’s new research project, life at Hogwarts continued roughly as normal. Harry continued to have nightmares that left him sleep deprived and irritable, but he survived. He also suffered through his painful headaches in DADA, and then got Hermione to help him understand the material later. He and Ron bumbled through Potions. Essays were peer-edited by the group. The only subject Harry thought he really excelled in was Astronomy, because in the long sleepless stretches between nightmares he would review the stars and constellations on his night sky poster to help calm him down. 

One night, Hermione even dragged the group to Ravenclaw Debate Night. 

One of the best parts of Debate Night was the abundance of food. The food wasn't free, but it was well worth the money, because all of the food was all incredible. For appetizers there was dumplings and shrimp tempura and thousand dipping sauces, and muggle chips artfully arranged on plates, as well as platters of sushi, and salads with strange mushrooms you couldn’t find in any grocery store. 

If you got thirsty during Debate Night, there was tons and tons of tea, some of which had been dyed fascinating colors, or had edible glitter floating in it. There was also pumpkin juice, but all of it had been dyed deep blue. If you wanted something sweet, there were plates with wobbling stacks of pancakes, dripping syrup, and beautiful little cupcakes, each a different, strange flavor, rather like Bertie Bott’s beans. 

There were tables of arts and crafts, too. One witch had created gorgeous quill pens. Another witch had created a bunch of earrings and other jewelry. There were tons of little books called “zines”, too. There was a divination zine made by a third year wearing a soft pink sweater. A guy who'd brought his cat with him to Debate Night had made a herbology zine. There was a zine that seemed like a mixture of a foodie and potions zine, which was filled with tips and tricks on how to add a little magic to your tea or toast or whatever. There were tons of Quidditch/broomcare zines, and even a zine about muggle rock music. The zines were pretty cheap, and Harry bought a couple of his favorites. Parvati, he saw, ended up in long conversation with the third year in the pink sweater, and ended up subscribing to her zine.

The night was presided over by a seventh year with gorgeous dark hair, who wore a fitted, navy blue muggle button up scattered with constellations, and black skinny jeans. Also helping out was a sixth year with curly lavender-gray hair down to her shoulders. 

The first event was the judging of the Hogwarts replicas made out of marzipan. Harry’s favorite replica, and the one that won, showed each house’ common room as their animal. The dungeons were green and scaled, curling through the lower castle. Somewhere near the kitchens it got yellow and black and furry. Gryffindor tower’s top had the ruff of a lion. Ravenclaw tower had wings that flapped. Ever flap caused the sugar crystal stars hanging in the sky around the castle to flutter in the air and sparkle a little brighter. 

After that there was a debate over the deeper meaning of one of The Weird Sisters’ albums, and then four poetry recitations, a violin recital, a rap battle, a debate over value of school or lack thereof, then one over school uniforms. Then there was a comedy routine and then a fierce debate over if white chocolate qualified as chocolate, and then another violin recital. The entertainment just kept coming. 

There weren’t actually as many debates as you would expect, Hermione explained in an undertone during the fourth piano recital of the night, because the real debate was over how many points each person got. Every attendee got twenty one points to spread around their favorites. The person who got voted the most points, got to wear the special hat. Hermione gestured to the lavender haired witch. “She won last time, so she presents it to the next winner.” 

The hat turned out to be a gorgeous wix hat, navy blue with stars and a moon. It was wreathed in pink-gold roses and laurel, and a spray of eagle feathers. It was given to someone from the debate over school uniforms, who had made some very good points while being polite and funny at the same time. 

You could buy a bag of party favors at the end of the night if you wanted. Harry ended up splurging and grabbing one, using his money leftover from school supply shopping at Diagon Alley. In Harry’s, he found a box of Chocolate Frogs that an attached note reported to be incredibly lucky, two packets of edible glitter, a vinyl of the Weird Sisters album the debate had been over and a little IOU to borrow a record player if he wanted to listen to the album, a paperback of e.e. cumming poetry, and three sets of thick, colorful wool socks. 

Harry found the e.e. cumming poetry a little strange, and gave it to Padma, who really loved it, in exchange for a wonderfully trashy action graphic novel. Parvati got the edible glitter- she ate all of her food sparkly for two weeks, using all the glitter she’d taken off their group of friends- but Harry kept the other stuff. Harry had never had nice warm wool socks like these before, only Dudley’s worn, hole-filled socks, and the Weird Sisters album turned out to be pretty good. 

He only opened up the Chocolate Frogs, after Neville had been really chewed out by Snape. Neville had started crying as soon as class was over, and the group of friends were trying to comfort him. Harry wasn’t very good at it, but he remembered the sweater man offering mirror-Harry chocolate, so he pulled out the Chocolate Frogs. 

Maybe the Chocolate Frogs were lucky after all. Neville’s frog had an odd mutation, an extra leg that stuck out of the middle of its back, that causes to flop around very oddly. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk started trying to fake hunt it, whipping along at her impressive speed, but then the frog used it’s extra foot to kick her right in the nose, and she cringed away in confusion. The sight distracted Neville, and he actually started smiling a little as he watched it hop around. 

The group started talking about it, though for once, Parvati didn’t join in. Instead Parvati was drawing something quite intently. Harry couldn’t help but wonder if her feelings were hurt somehow, so he decided to offer her a chocolate frog. 

“Parvati?” 

She startled, covering up her work quickly. “Oh- sorry- you scared me, Harry,” She said. “I’m not mad at you or anything- but like, I’m working on a surprise, so I can’t show it to you, or tell you about it, even though it’s going to be really cool…” 

“It’s fine,” Harry reassured her. “Do you want a chocolate frog?” 

“Yeah, sure,” Parvati said distractedly, taking one. “D’you want the card? You collect them, right?” She bit the chocolate frog’s head off and then set it down, before returning to drawing. 

Harry looked over the card; it was Dumbledore again, which reminded Harry of the mirror again. He wondered where the mirror had been moved. He would never admit it, but on some of those sleepless nights, he had gone wandering under his cloak, looking for the mirror.

“I got Godric Gryffindor!” Neville said, smiling a little more now. “Gold edition, too- those are rare! Harry, what did you get?” 

“Dumbledore,” Harry spoke up. “Blah blah… defeat of Dark Lord Grindelwald… twelve uses of dragon’s blood… worked on alchemy with some guy named Nicolas Flamel…” 

“Nicolas Flamel?” Padma said suddenly. “Wasn’t he the one who created the… that one Stone thing? Could that be-” 

“Could that be the Stone that Snape was talking about?” Ron finished. 

“Just a moment!” Hermione cried, and dug through her bag until she pulled out an enormous old book. "I never thought to look in here- I got this out of the library weeks ago for a bit of light reading, it has a whole section all about alchemy, I bet if I can just-” She flipped to the very back, and started running her finger down the page. 

"Light?" said Ron. 

“Here it is!” Hermione cried in excitement. “Page 567- just a moment-” Hermione flipped through the pages until she hit the right one, and started to read it aloud. "Nicolas Flamel is the only known maker of the Philosopher's Stone! Here, look right here, it says, ‘The stone will transform any metal into pure gold. It also produces the Elixir of Life, which will make the drinker immortal. There have been many reports of the Philosopher's Stone over the centuries, but the only Stone currently in existence belongs to Mr. Nicolas Flamel!’ See? The dog must be guarding Flamel's Philosopher's Stone! I bet he asked Dumbledore to keep it safe for him, because they're friends and maybe he thinks someone is coming after it or something, that's why he wanted the Stone moved out of Gringotts!" 

"A stone that makes gold and stops you from ever dying..." Parvati murmured in awe. “No wonder Flamel’d want to keep that safe- if I had that, I wouldn’t ever let it out of my sight. I could have all the glitter I could ever want! All my food would sparkle!” 

“I’d buy an entire new greenhouse,” Neville put in. “And a new Potions professor,” he added as an afterthought, making Ron laugh. 

“I’d buy a whole Quidditch team!” Ron said, waving his hands around cheerfully. “They’d all have the best equitment, and I’d help them come up with new moves… they would be called the Ronsters, I think.” 

“That’s a terrible name,” Parvati spoke up from where she was coloring something in with the muggle markers Hermione had given her for Christmas. “You should name them the Ron Ragers, or the Redhead Ragers, or something. You could have part of their uniform be dying their hair red, or drawing on freckles.” 

“That’s actually a pretty good idea,” Ron agreed with a grin. 

In the next week or two, the group chattered almost constantly about the stone, and what they would do with it. Hermione wanted to buy her own library, and spend her immortality doing all the research she could ever want. Padma would have her own library, too, but she mostly seemed to be interesting in travelling the world, and spending her immortality becoming fluent in every language and dialect. Harry told them he wasn’t sure what he’d buy, but secretly, if he had that much money, all he would do with it would be to buy his own place, far away from the Dursleys. 

One day, Hermione gestured for them all to come to the Ravenclaw table. “Guys,” She spoke up excitedly, “you’ve got see this! You especially, Neville!” 

It was a little booklet- a zine, like the ones sold at Ravenclaw Debate Night. The title was “Hazards of Hogwarts”. The others flipped through it excitedly, and were already chattering about it when it was at last passed to Harry. Harry flipped through it slowly, reading it and looking at the pictures.

One the front page was a picture of a dragon with an eagle perched on it’s shoulder, a snake dangling from it’s neck, and a badger and a lion sitting next to it, with HAZARDS OF HOGWARTS written on top. 

On the next page was written, “you may noticed by now, that Hogwarts isn’t always the best place to learn. For instance, in Potions, Professor Snape is always cruel and unfair. He’s much more supportive to Slytherins than any other Houses.” Under the paragraph was a doodle of a badger, an eagle, a lion and a snake. 

The next page read, “Obviously, we shouldn’t blame Slytherins for this! It isn’t their fault that their Head of House isn’t fair! But Professor Snape bullies many students. He tells them they aren’t smart, or they aren’t quick enough, instead of telling them politely, what they could do better.” There was a doodle of a frowning bat shouting censored out expletives at a small badger. 

“I think that if Professor Snape was kinder and nicer to students, they would probably feel more relaxed. I bet that a lot of the reason that many students don’t do well in his class, is because they are so nervous and stressed! Everyone has the potential to be good at Potions… if Professor Snape would help them,” the next page read. There was a drawing of a bubbling pot of potions. 

“We were never warned we would have nasty teachers at Hogwarts. We were told not to tickle sleeping dragons and to do our homework, but how do you survive Potions when he hates you?” The page following read. In the middle of the page was a large doodle of a raven, a lion and a snake hugging a badger, with the words “GROUP HUG!!” written below them. 

The next page answered its own question. “First of all! Know you’re not alone! If you are being bullied & treated unfairly by Professor Snape, you are not alone! You can always talk to your friends about how you are being treated unfairly. Tell your Head of House about the unfair treatment. Tell your parents and ask them to complain to the school board.” There was a drawing of an owl carrying a bundle of letters, under which it read, “Maybe if we get enough people to write to the school board and Professor Dumbledore, something will happen to change this nasty situation!” 

The next paragraph added, on the following page, “Second of all, don’t let this ruin potionsmaking for you! You shouldn’t let this one nasty, cruel teacher snuff out your love for a subject. That would be like letting Professor Snape win! Don’t do that!” There was a little doodle of a snake stirring a potion while a hovering raven dropped in ingredients.

“Third of all, know this is not your fault. Just because Professor Snape says you are dumb, doesn’t mean you are. Just because you aren’t as good at Potions as some people, doesn’t mean he has the right to bully you so cruelly!” The zine continued. There was a doodle of a badger saying “You’re a great friend and super amazing!!” to a blushing lion under the paragraph. 

On the last page, the writer finished up by concluding, “Remember, be supportive of your friends who are getting bullied by Professor Snape! Tell your parents and Head of House! Remember that you are not alone, and don’t let this ruin Potions for you! Also, everyone who has been bullied or degraded by Professor Snape, draw spirals on your hands the Friday before the next Quidditch match! That way, everyone can see that they are not alone! If you want to support friends or even strangers who are being bullied by Professor Snape, draw hearts to show your support!” There was a picture of a smiling dragon, hugging an eagle, a badger, a lion and a snake, under which was written, “Remember, Hogwarts should be a safe place for everyone to learn!”

“They were in all of the girls’ bathrooms, and in the library, too,” Hermione spoke up with a smile. “Neville, Harry- they’re right. You guys aren’t alone. No one deserves to be treated the way that Professor Snape treats you guys. Honestly, I don’t know how such an abusive professor got hired.” 

Harry nodded. He was grateful for the support, but a little bit surprised. It didn’t seem bad enough to make Hermione so upset- it wasn’t as bad as the Dursleys, anyway. Professor Snape was much worse to Neville, anyway. He took a closer look at the zine as the others consoled Neville, who looked a little bit teary. “Parvati… did you make this?” 

Parvati blushed. “I can’t believe I was so obvious,” She said, rubbing her face like she was embarrassed. “Yeah, I made it. I just… I don’t think that it’s okay, what Professor Snape’s been doing. Hopefully, we can change things.” 

“I don’t know,” Neville said uncertainly. “I mean- thank you so much, Parvati, you wouldn’t believe how much this means to me…” Neville looked a little teary now, but he shrugged sadly. “I don’t know if it can change much… Draco Malfoy’s father is on the school board, and he and Professor Snape are pretty much best friends. And Professor Snape might punish those who wear spirals, or hearts, on their hands.”

“I guess,” Parvati said, looking downtrodden. She fiddled with her butterfly clip and looked down at the table sadly. 

Hermione gave Parvati an encouraging nudge and said, “I think that it’s an amazing idea! I’m definitely going to do it, no question. I don’t care if Professor Snape punishes me, because this is the right thing to do.” 

“If we all do it,” Ron said, “Professor Snape won’t really be able to punish all of us! Professor McGonagall and Flitwick would get involved if he took points from all of us, and he’s not going to take points from his own house.” He grinned and high fived Parvati. “I’ll definitely do it.” 

“He might give Harry detention, though,” Neville pointed out worriedly. “I mean- I’ll do it.” He paused a moment, then whispered, “I think.” 

“I’m doing it,” Padma said with a firm nod. 

Everybody looked at Harry, who shrugged uncertainly. “I mean… I’d probably get detention,” He murmered. 

“I’ll do it if you do it,” Neville said suddenly, looking determined. 

Harry looked at Neville; he knew this was important to Neville, knew that Neville wanted to do it, if only he had the courage. Harry nodded. “Alright, I’ll do it.” 

“Yay!” Parvati cheered. 

“I know this really great copying spell,” Hermione started telling Parvati.

“I can put them in the Ravenclaw common room,” Padma offered. 

“I can put them in the boys’ bathrooms,” Ron suggested.

Friday morning before breakfast, Harry grabbed his quill and went to the bathroom to do it. He drew just a few spirals, small ones, on the back of each hand. He was just finishing a last one when Blaise exited the shower, fiddling with his tie. He glanced over at Harry’s hands, one eyebrow raising noticeably. Harry blushed, put away his quill, and quickly transitioned to tying his tie in the mirror, which he had only gotten moderately better at doing over the course of the school year. 

As Harry gathered his stuff to go to breakfast, he found himself trying to hide his spiral-doodled hands in his sleeves. He could just imagine Malfoy laughing at him, or Nott making that face that meant he thought he was better than you. 

At breakfast, he saw that Padma, Parvati, Neville, Ron and Hermione were all sitting together at the Gryffindor table. When they saw him, they waved him over. 

Hermione was wearing just her school shirt, and not her sweater or robes. Her sleeves were neatly rolled up, and her hands and arms were covered with hearts, with a couple of spirals mixed in. Anti bullying quotes were written all over her arms. Padma, whose hands were covered with hearts as well, was copying down one of the quotes to her own arm. 

“I’m so excited!” She was saying to Ron. “I’ve never broken the rules before! I can’t believe it- I’m breaking dress code!” 

Ron himself had also drawn hearts all over his hands; they were small but plentiful, each one filled in with black ink. “Why does it have to be hearts?” He was half-heartedly complaining. 

Parvati was wearing a couple extra butterfly clips in her hair and looked to be in high spirits. She’d also pushed her sleeves up a little bit, to show the big, bright red hearts she’d painted onto her skin. She was squealing with delight as she high-fived Neville, who had followed through and covered his hands with spirals. 

They weren’t the only ones, either. When Harry cautiously looked around the room, he could see other people had done it, too. Fred and George Weasley were both covered; Fred had a huge hot pink heart on each cheek, and spirals and hearts up and down his exposed arms. He was drawing hearts and spirals onto George’s neck; when George turned around, Harry saw that he had pink hearts identical to Fred’s. 

A lot of Gryffindor’s were doing it; there were lots of spirals, but also some hearts. Over at Hufflepuff, there were some spirals, almost as many as in Gryffindor; and almost everyone there seemed to be adorned with hearts. One upperclassman with pink hair had forgone her tights and had covered her legs with tiny hearts; it must have taken her forever. There wasn’t as much support in Ravenclaw, but there was still a lot; the only place there didn’t seem to be any support was in Slytherin. 

At first, the teachers didn’t seem to notice, but then the Weasley twins sat down. Their face adornments were clearly visible, and hard to miss, from the vantage point of the teacher’s table. 

Professor McGonagall went over to confront them. “Mr. and Mr. Weasley,” She said. “ What in the name of Merlin happened to your faces?” 

“An allergic reaction-” Fred said. 

“-to favoritism-” George explained. 

“-and general bullshittery-” Fred added. 

“- and unwashed hair,” George threw in as a parting shot. 

“Fifteen points from Gryffindor for disrespect of a teacher,” Professor McGonagall said. Harry could have sworn her lips were twitching. Any remark like that would have normally gotten twenty or even thirty points off. “And detention.” As Professor McGonagall returned to the teacher’s table, the Gryffindor table actually broke into applause. The twins stood and took turns bowing. Professor Snape looked positively murderous. 

During Potions, Professor Snape also took away tons of points from Gryffindor. He may have made excuses, but it was clear to everyone there it was about the ink on their hands. But, Ron told Harry later rather excitedly, the other teachers had done the opposite, giving tons of points for silly reasons. Ron personally had gotten twenty points from Professor Flitwick for “very nicely brushed hair”.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is kind of just a fluff chapter, which is part of why I'm posting it now instead of Saturday. Hopefully this fluff makes up for the pain of the last chapter...
> 
> It makes sense to me that zines would be popular at Hogwarts. Zines could cover tips and tricks for various subjects, or be based around more obscure studies. Zine makers could sell at Debate Night, and send a zine a week/month/whenever to subscribers by owl. 
> 
> I have no real basis for Debate Night other than... I wanted it to exist so it does. :P
> 
> Also... someone who will appear again later in the story is cameo'd here. If you correctly guess who it is, I will give you a virtual cookie.
> 
> also alsooo... thank you guys so much for almost 300 kudos!! I don't even... ahh wow.


	12. double dragon dare

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry has his first foray into the wonderful world of breaking laws.

In the weeks following the stars and hearts day, tons of kids talked about how they had gotten their parents to send letters about Professor Snape. Molly Weasley even sent a howler to Professor Snape. The red envelope arrived in the middle of breakfast, and began to shout, “-WHEN I HEARD FROM MY SON THAT YOU’VE BEEN BULLYING HARRY POTTER, I THOUGHT SURELY NOT- I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU STILL CAN’T SEE PAST CHILDHOOD RIVALRIES AND TREAT CHILDREN FROM ALL HOUSES EQUALLY, YOU ARE AFTER ALL AN ADULT- INCREDIBLY INSENSITIVE-” 

Professor Snape vanished his food and trapped the Howler under his plate, where he exploded it with a spell, and then he dramatically swept out of the room. 

Despite all of the letters, Ron told Harry about how Lucius Malfoy was campaigning hard to keep Professor Snape from being restricted or punished in any way. In the end, it seemed Mr. Malfoy won; for a few weeks Professor Snape wasn’t quite as sarcastic and mean, and was almost fair, and then once it was clear that Mr. Malfoy had swayed the entire school board to the decision that Professor Snape only needed a mere slap on the wrist, almost at once returned to his nasty ways, although it was worth noting that his nasty ways were now slightly subtler than before. 

“It was worth a try,” Parvati said, disheartened. “At least it bought us a little bit of peace, for a while.” 

Hermione’s mouth was set and she was barely eating, just angrily cutting up her meat. “It’s not fair!” She burst out. 

“I know,” Ron grumbled through a full mouth. “Now he’s just allowed to keep on taking tons of points from Gryffindors, and bullying Harry and Neville.” He took another bite, considered things, and then added, “Well, I did get to see my mum really dig into Snape, though. That’s a memory to treasure.” The school had also enjoyed the letter incident. A lot of students, Gryffindors especially, had gotten into a bit of a habit of quoting the now infamous letter. If something fell, someone else would hiss, "-incredibly insensitive-" or if someone did something stupid, "-you are after all adult-". The odd trend pittered out after a while, but it was funny while it lasted./p>

As time continued to pass and they drew closer to the end of the school year, Hermione began to worry over exams. She started drawing up study schedules and color coding all her notes. Padma and Parvati seemed to like it. Parvati liked it for more aesthetic reasons, though- she created a gorgeous study schedule, complete with colorcoded notes on what to do when, and pretty doodles, and then proceeded to completely disregard it. Padma on the other hand was better at actually studying, but even she didn’t buy into it very much, instead saying that she believed that since she had paid attention in class, she should be fine for the finals. Ron took the same mindset. 

Hermione’s frenzy of worry badly affected Neville, on the other hand, and Harry also had to admit he was feeling quite nervous. As soon as Hermione remarked about needing to pass the exams to get into second year, he began wondering if he would fail, if all those days he was too tired from nightmares to pay as much attention as he should would mean he would be stuck back at the Dursleys. The Dursleys would be very unhappy to have him back, and would probably be loads meaner to him than before… and Harry would lose his friends. As much as he dearly loved Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, he loved having human friends along with his snake friend- and when he was at the Dursleys, he had been constantly worried that Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk would be discovered, and perhaps hurt or even killed by Aunt Petunia. 

The teachers seemed to be thinking along the same lines as Hermione; they piled so much homework on them that the Easter holidays weren't nearly as much fun as the Christmas ones. Harry had nothing against studying, and even enjoyed it when he was working with his friends, but he began to get sick of spending hours in the library working on his homework, and then further hours forcing himself to study, motivating himself by thinking of having to return to the Dursleys. Even that frantic, desperate motivation began to drain slightly, and it got harder and harder to keep studying.

Instead of studying, Padma ended up spending some more time with her other friends, who were in Ravenclaw. Parvati spent more time painting her nails and braiding her hair and things with Lavender. Ron headed off to talk about Quidditch with the Gryffindor boys more. Still, Harry kept at the studying; him, Neville and Hermione constantly quizzed each other on facts, shared books and notes, and relied on each other for motivation. 

Harry was (theoretically, but in practice not really) studying in the library with Neville and Hermione when he saw Hagrid in the library, acting rather oddly. “Hey! Hagrid!” he whisper-shouted, curious why he was acting so strangely, and also wanting an excuse to stop with his pathetic attempt at studying. 

Hagrid shuffled into view, looking a little bit sheepish and hiding something behind his back. He looked very out of place in his moleskin overcoat. 

"I’m- er- jus' lookin'," he said, in a rather shifty voice. "An' what're you lot up ter?" 

“Studying,” Harry said, and couldn’t help but sigh a little as he said so. 

“Durin’ lunch hours?” Hagrid’s bushy eyebrows rose slightly. “I think yeh better take a break. Yeh don’t wanna burn yerselves out, with all tha’ studyin’. Breaks are important, too.” He seemed to realize he was rambling slightly, and began to awkwardly shuffle out of the library. 

“Do you- um- think we could come over to your place, for tea?” Harry asked. 

“Sure,” Hagrid absently. “Whenever yeh like- yer always welcome ter visit, Harry.” 

Harry couldn’t help but grin in surprise but that. 

“What was he hiding behind his back?" said Hermione thoughtfully, looking up from her book at long last. 

"I'm going to see what section he was in," Harry said. He returned with a pile of books in his arms that he’d grabbed off of the shelves. 

"Dragons!" Harry whispered. "I almost forgot they were real- Look at these: Dragon Species of Great Britain and Ireland; From Egg to Inferno, A Dragon Keeper's Guide." Harry flipped through a book slowly, then grinned, and added, “Hagrid's always wanted a dragon, he told me so the first time I ever met him. D’you think he might have scored one? Where would you even get a dragon?”

“Um, Harry,” Neville said slowly, “It’s… it’s illegal. Dragon breeding was outlawed; it’s kind of obvious to muggles, you know, and besides, it’s really dangerous.” 

"So what on Earth’s Hagrid up to?" said Hermione. “Do you think he’s got a dragon egg? Do you think he’s in very much danger?” She looked terribly anxious. “I haven’t researched dragons much… I’ll have to do that.” 

“We could ask Ron,” Neville suggested, looking eager for a reason to stop studying for a while. “He’s sure to know something about dragons; his brother Charlie works at a dragon reserve.” 

Neville and Harry were both glad to leave the library. The rest of the lunch break was spent with Ron, who was happy to provide them with a dozen or so stories of particularly nasty burns and injuries that Charlie had gotten at one point or another. 

Neville, Harry, Hermione and Ron went to Hagrid’s hut after classes were over. When they knocked on the door of Hagrid’s hut, they saw that all the curtains were closed. Hagrid called "Who is it?" before he let them in, and then shut the door quickly behind them.

It was stifling hot inside. Even though it was such a warm day, there was a blazing fire in the grate. Hagrid made them tea and offered them stoat sandwiches, which all of them except poor polite Neville declined. 

They made small talk about the recent attempts to study and the extra homework, until Harry asked if he could open a window to deal with the heat. 

"Can't, Harry, sorry," said Hagrid. Harry noticed him glance at the fire. Harry looked at it, too; in the very heart of the fire, underneath the kettle, was a huge, black egg. 

“Hagrid,” Neville asked slowly, his voice wobbling slightly with nerves, “what’s that?” 

"Ah," said Hagrid, "That's er..."  
"Where did you get it, Hagrid?" said Ron, crouching over the fire to get a closer look at the egg. "It must've cost you a fortune." 

"Won it," said Hagrid. "Las' night. I was down in the village havin' a few drinks an' got into a game o' cards with a stranger. Think he was quite glad ter get rid of it, ter be honest." Harry could imagine he would be; any sensible person would be glad to be rid of contraband, especially dangerous contraband like a dragon egg. 

"But what are you going to do with it when it's hatched?" said Hermione practically. 

"Well, I've bin doin' some readin' , said Hagrid, pulling a large book from under his pillow. "Got this outta the library -- Dragon Breeding for Pleasure and Profit -- it's a bit outta date, o' course, but it's all in here. Keep the egg in the fire, 'cause their mothers breathe on I em, see, an' when it hatches, feed it on a bucket o' brandy mixed with chicken blood every half hour. An' see here -- how ter recognize diff'rent eggs -- what I got there's a Norwegian Ridgeback. They're rare, them." He beamed down happily at the egg.

"Hagrid, you live in a wooden house," Hermione pointed out, a note of worry threaded into her voice. 

That night at dinner, they gathered the group at the Ravenclaw table and quietly explained the situation to those who hadn’t been there. 

“This is going to end terribly,” Hermione concluded her summary of the past events. 

“A dragon,” Parvati sighed happily. “I’d imagine they’d be gorgeous- almost as good as unicorns.” 

“He lives in a wooden house,” Padma said slowly, in an undertone. 

“Exactly what I said!” Hermione whispered aggressively. “He doesn’t seem to realize how dangerous it is! And, it seems like he thinks he’ll be helping the dragon- if he raises the dragon without the proper- space and accommodations and whatnot- it’ll be terrible for the poor dragon. Mind, I haven’t researched enough to know what are the proper space and accommodations, but I really doubt it’s a small, wooden hut.” 

There was a rumbling as the group agreed. 

“We should try to persuade Hagrid to give the dragon up and not try to raise it,” Ron said. “He’s going to get into so much trouble if anyone finds out.”

“We can’t just release it onto the grounds, though,” Ron said. “That wouldn’t work.” 

“Your brother Charlie,” Neville said slowly, “he works at a dragon reserve? We could send the egg there…” There were a few minutes of silence, and Neville deflated, sighing, “stupid idea, I know.” 

“No no,” Padma hurried to reassure him. “We just need to think through the details and whatnot…” 

“We should start at once,” Harry said quietly, “I imagine an egg would be much easier to transport than a real, live, fire breathing dragon. Ron, how about if you write a letter to Charlie, and we can see what he thinks, and how he thinks we should do it.” 

Over the next few days, Ron slowly wrote a letter to his brother, in between slogging through all of the homework he had, and the long breaks he required to deal with all of the extra homework. When he was done with the letter, Hermione proofread it, and then they sent it off to Charlie. They could only hope he would agree to it, and that they could figure out a way to pull the entire thing off. 

Almost a week later, they got Charlie’s letter back; Ron hurried into the library with the letter. 

Dear Ron, 

How are you? Thanks for the letter -- I'd be glad to take the Norwegian Ridgeback, but it won't be easy getting him here. I think the best thing will be to send him over with some friends of mine who are coming to visit me next week. Trouble is, they mustn't be seen carrying an illegal dragon. 

Could you get the Ridgeback up the tallest tower at midnight on Saturday? They can meet you there and take him away while it's still dark. 

When the day comes, if the Ridgeback hasn’t hatched, pad the box you put the egg in as best you could, and use some sort of warming charm or something to try to keep him as warm as possible. If the Ridgeback has hatched by then, feed the Ridgeback a bit extra that day, and that should calm him down. 

Send me an answer as soon as possible. 

Love, 

Charlie 

"We've got the invisibility cloak," said Ron. "It shouldn't be too difficult -- I think the cloaks big enough to cover two of us and a box with the dragon egg in it."

“It seems pretty dangerous,” Hermione fretted. “I don’t know…” 

“How about this,” Harry said slowly. “I’ll hire Fred and George to do it for us. They’ve got lots of experience with this sort of thing, right? Less likely to make any rookie mistakes like we would…” 

Hermione seemed slightly reassured. 

Then, during breakfast on Monday, an owl brought Harry a note from Hagrid. He had written only two words: It's hatching.  
Ron wanted to skip Herbology and go straight down to the hut, and had mostly persuaded Parvati to do the same. Hermione, who was lingering near the Gryffindor table, wouldn't hear of it. "Hermione, how many times in our lives are we going to see a dragon hatching?" 

"You’ve got lessons, you’ll get into trouble, and that's nothing to what Hagrid's going to be in when someone finds out what he's doing--" 

"Shut up!" Harry, who had just come over, whispered. Malfoy was only a few feet away and he had stopped dead to listen. Harry knew that it was only a few days before they would be free of the Ridgeback completely, but still, that look on Malfoy’s pointy face made Harry rather worried. 

In the end, Hermione agreed that they should all meet at Hagrid’s hut during morning break. Padma and Hermione headed off to Potions, Ron, Parvati and Neville off to Herbology, and Harry off to History of Magic. 

History of Magic seemed to go on forever; Harry could barely pay attention to the small talk Tracey was making next to him, let alone the actual teacher. About halfway through class, Malfoy sent a note over. 

Heart pounding, Harry slowly unfolded the note, putting his arms around it so he could get as much privacy as possible. Tracey politely looked away as he read it. 

Potter-

If you don’t let me watch the dragon hatching, I’ll tell Professor Snape all about what you and your friends are up to. 

Harry bit his lip hard to hold back an angry, frustrated groan. He dipped his quill into his ink pot, and then responded-

Malfoy- 

Fine. Come with me after the bell rings. Don’t tell a single person, otherwise I’ll set my snake on you, and she’ll strangle you in your sleep. 

He sent the note back to Malfoy, who read it, and actually chuckled at the threat. He had an annoyingly charming laugh. Harry did not approve. 

When the bell sounded from the castle at the end of their lesson, Harry packed his books and things as quickly as he could, and then walked to Hagrid’s hut, Malfoy a half step behind him, and smirking in an incredibly annoying way. 

Hagrid greeted Harry, looking flushed and excited- and then he saw Malfoy, and almost choked on his own spit. “Wh-what’s he doing here?” he asked. 

“Blackmail,” Harry said grimly. “Can we go in?” 

"Ye-yeah, sure, it's nearly out." Hagrid ushered them inside. Malfoy made a few almost obligatory disgusted looks around at the hut, then immediately turned his full attention to the egg. 

The others were already inside; they had drawn their chairs up around the egg, which was lying on the table. There were deep cracks in it. Something was moving inside; a funny clicking noise was coming from it. 

“Hey Harry,” Ron said, and then looked up and did a double take. “What the hell, Harry?” he asked, sounding surprised and angry. 

“Blackmail,” Was all Harry said. He grabbed a chair of his own and drew it up to the table; next to him, Malfoy, who oddly enough seemed to be sticking near him, did the same thing. 

They watched with bated breath, when all at once there was a scraping noise and the egg split open. The baby dragon flopped onto the table, looking tired and kind of sticky. It wasn't exactly pretty; Harry thought it looked like a crumpled, black umbrella. Its spiny wings were huge compared to its skinny body, it had a long snout with wide nostrils, little stubs of horns and big, bulging orange eyes.

It sneezed; a couple of sparks flew out of its snout. Parvati made an “awwwhhhh” noise, and melted onto the table, staring at the baby dragon in awe and delight. 

"Isn't he beautiful?" Hagrid murmured in agreement. He reached out a hand to stroke the dragon's head. It snapped at his fingers, showing pointed fangs. Malfoy laughed rather nastily.

"Bless him, look, he knows his mommy!" said Hagrid, sighing with happiness. Malfoy laughed even harder, stuffing a pale fist into his mouth to make some miniscule attempt at containing his sniggers. Hermione glared at him, as did Parvati. 

“I wonder,” Padma was murmuring, “What the spikes along the wings are for… it seems like they wouldn’t be useful against predators, as they would be in a difficult position to use in a fight…” 

“And they would reduce aerodynamics,” Hermione murmured. “It seems entirely counterproductive..” 

“Aerodinameeks?” Malfoy chortled. “Is that some muggle thing?” 

“It’s the properties of a solid, in relation to how air moves around it,” Hermione explained primly. “It’s got to do with air resistance; air resistance is why an unballed piece of pap- I mean, parchment will fall slower than a crumpled ball of parchment, even though it’s technically the same amount.” 

“I know what air resistance is,” Malfoy scowled. “We talk about it all the time when it comes to Quidditch; that’s why seekers are supposed to be smaller, so they can go faster, and the wind doesn’t have as much to push against. But how would the dragon choose whether or not to have spikes?" 

Hermione started talking about evolution, and then pretty soon Malfoy and Hermione were in a full on argument. Meanwhile Harry was engrossed in watching the dragon. It kept on making little noises which sounded almost like words to Harry; slippery, cawing sort of words, like if a crow tried to speak Parseltongue. When he concentrated harder, they became clearer, until he could understand a little bit of it; the baby dragon was babbling about food. It was also quite confused. 

Harry glanced at Malfoy to make sure that he was properly distracted, and then hissed, “Calm down. You’re not in any danger.” Malfoy glanced over a moment after Harry had finished speaking, an odd look on his face.

“I think your dragon is hungry,” Harry said to Hagrid, after clearing his throat and starting a few times to make sure he was speaking regularly. 

“W-were you speaking to that dragon?” Malfoy asked. His expression made Harry a little bit nervous, so he lied through his teeth, saying, “No, I was just imitating the sounds.” 

“It’s a muggle thing,” Hermione said quickly. “Muggles do it when they think an animal is cute; it’s like you’re pretending to talk to them, even though you really can’t.” 

Malfoy seemed sufficiently convinced and began to argue with Hermione again; Harry shot Hermione a grateful look. 

Padma gave Harry a look that told him that she would want to do further experiments about Parseltongue use on dragons later. Harry shrugged and then glanced at Malfoy to show that he was up for it, but not while Malfoy was there. 

Throughout the next few days, Malfoy actually acted pretty nice- but he dragged Harry to Hagrid’s hut at almost every free opportunity. On Wednesday, Harry finally, in frustration, told him that he was free to go down to Hagrid’s hut alone if he liked. 

“Stupid Potter,” Malfoy said, “I need a sacrifice in case the dragon goes on a rampage.” There was something very slightly off about his face, though; it was only then that Harry realized Malfoy was actually scared of Hagrid. 

With Malfoy actually acting like a decent person for once, he wasn’t terrible company, but it also meant they couldn’t explain the plan to Hagrid, because Malfoy would be sure to hear it, too. So, when an opportunity came to talk to Hagrid without Malfoy there, Harry took it. 

Norbert was prancing around, tail knocking down mugs, dishes, and other items. There was already quite a few shattered ceramics on the floor. 

“Norbert, honey,” Hagrid was saying awkwardly, when the bell rang. Malfoy wandered out, ignoring the situation, but Harry said, “I’ll stay back and help Hagrid; go tell Malfoy that, will you?” The others nodded, seeing what Harry was planning on doing, and filed out. 

“Ahhhrhhk,” Harry said- “Nobert” had told him that she had named herself Ahhrhhk instead- “pleassse don’t do that.” 

“What?” Ahhrhhk asked in her thick accented Parseltongue. “I can’t underssstand you.” 

“Ahhrhhk,” Harry said again, trying to speak more gutturally, “Pleassse don’t do that. Go sssit back in the corner if you like, it’s warmer there. If you do that, I’ll give you sssomething ssshiny.” He dug around in his pocket and held up an old, dried inkpot he had found in his bag. “Sssee how nice and ssshiny it is? Don’t you want it? If you want it, go sssit in the fire again. Go! Go sssit in the corner if you want it!” 

Ahhrhhk paused in her wandering around the room, tilting her head to one side, and then tried to snap at the inkpot. “No,” Harry said as sternly as he could, “Go sssit in the fire and then I’ll give it to you. Do you want it? Go sssit in the corner.” He picked up the inkpot, waving it around and then pointed to the fire. Ahhrhhk finally went over and sat down in the fireplace, snuggling down into the heart of the flames. "Good enough," Harry sighed and gave Ahhrhhk the shiny inkpot. 

“Thank yeh so much,” Hagrid said with a sigh of relief. “Does that imitation thin’ really work so well? How do yeh make it sound so… real?”

Harry shrugged. "I think it just calms h- him down, hearing something that sounds like him," He said, avoiding saying that he wasn’t imitating Ahhrhhk, but rather actually making an attempt at speaking her language. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about,” Harry added slowly. “About Ah- I mean, Norbert.” 

“Yeah?” Hagrid asked. 

“I’m sorry I wasn’t able to mention it earlier cuz of Malfoy, but, ah,” Harry explained the whole deal with Charlie. “Sh- He’d be much happier there, I bet,” Harry explained. “And, um, it would be much easier for you…” 

Luckily for everyone involved, when Harry was done with his spiel, Hagrid gave a big sigh, gave “Norbert” a longing look, and nodded. “I s’pose you’re right, Harry,” he said sadly. “He’s sure to miss his Mommy, though… I suppose he’ll have to survive…” 

Harry nodded, thanked Hagrid, and headed to class with a bit of a spring in his step. 

Harry could barely sleep on Saturday night, worried about Fred and George, wondering if the box Hagrid had created for “Norbert” was secure enough, wondering Fred and George would get caught, if anyone would be able to trace it back to Harry and his friends… 

“Go to sssleep, Harry,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk said. “I’ll protect you.” She puffed up, and opened her mouth to show her fangs. “Are they longer? I think they’ve been getting longer.” She licked her fangs intimidatingly. “Anyhow, they’re certainly long enough and deadly enough to take down that greasy human if he does anything…” 

“Thanksss, Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk,” Harry said, stroking her cool body. Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk was honestly so amazing to him; every time he had a nightmare, her confused and weirded out reaction to dreams in general seemed to dissipate the dream as if it didn’t matter. For her sake, he tried to get to sleep. 

The next day during breakfast, Fred and George came over to where he sat in the hall. “The- ah-” Fred looked around at the Slytherins nearby, all of whom were covertly trying to listen in, “-deed is done. The borrowed item will be returned to you after six weeks.” 

“Five,” Harry said, taking a bite of egg and trying to ignore the interest on Blaise’ face. 

“Five and a half and no lower,” George amended. 

“Acceptable.” Harry shook hands with first George, then Fred, and then returned to breakfast. Tracey was giving him a thoughtful look, as were Nott and Blaise; Harry determinely ignored them, and focused on eating his delicious eggs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The idea that Malfoy wanted to see Hagrid's dragon comes from a tumblr post. I don't remember whose, otherwise I would credit them. Hopefully they don't mind me using their idea. 
> 
> The Harry of TCF isn't as much of a risk taker as canon Harry; he's a Slytherin, so that means he's in an environment where caution and self-preservation is cultivated more than bravery and risk-taking behaviors. That's why he opts to pay someone else to do the actual deed, instead of doing it himself. 
> 
> Malfoy's lack of knowledge of evolution is due to the fact that I really doubt that wixen society is aware of that theory. Evolution is controversial (at least in America, I don't know about Britain) even in muggle society, so I doubt wix would be at all open to it. I'm not certain exactly how wix think the various animals and plants, but I doubt they believe in evolution. 
> 
> Anyway! I hope you liked! Feel free to tell me what you think in the comments. :)


	13. not so forbidden

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Malfoy is not happy with Harry. This does not go well- for Harry, at least.

Malfoy did not seem too happy when Harry told him that the dragon was gone. 

“Gone?” he hissed. “What do you mean gone?” 

“Wow, you don’t know what ‘gone’ means?” Harry asked sarcastically. “Look it up in the dictionary. Here, I’ll spell it out for you, it’s G-O-N-” 

“I know what gone means!” Malfoy sounded really angry now. “I mean what are you doing, telling me Hagrid, what, released the dragon and you didn’t even tell me he was planning on doing it?” 

“She’s on a dragon reserve in Romania, now- not that it’s any of your business,” Harry burst out. “And no, I didn’t tell you- you would have told Snape or something, tried to get us all in trouble with the law!” 

“No I wouldn’t!” Malfoy protested. “I would have gotten my father to arrange something so that the groundskeeper could keep the dragon- something about provision for learning, or whatever, my father would be able to come up with something…” 

“Well, the dragon is certainly better off now, with people who actually know how to care for her,” Harry pointed out. “And how was I supposed to know that? You certainly never said so- you blackmailed me into bringing you along to see her, and- you’ve made it clear you’ve hated me, ever since the start!” 

“No I did not!” Malfoy sneered. “It was you who made it clear you hated me- lying to me about where you were from, and then not shaking my hand, and insulting me to my face!” 

“Yeah- well I did that because it was clear you were bigoted, with that- that shit about muggleborns shouldn’t go to Hogwarts.” Harry huffed out an angry breath. “I’ve had more than enough of people judging my worth by something trivial like the color of my skin or if my parents were magical or not. Whether or not you have magic doesn’t make you a better person!” 

“Yes it does!” Malfoy said. “Muggles are like- dogs. They may look human, but they aren’t, not really.” 

Harry’s eyebrows rose almost to his hairline, and for a moment he could only gape at Malfoy. His hands were clenched in fists, and they were shaking with how upset he was. Finally he forced himself to laugh and say, “Oh my god, you sound like a Nazi. Next you’re going to be saying to send muggleborns to concentration camps.”

“Con-concentration camps?” Malfoy asked, confused. 

“Places the Germans sent the Jews during the war,” Harry explained, angry and incredulous. “You know? Where they killed tons of people in gas chambers and starved a whole bunch of the rest?”

“Huh,” Malfoy said apathetically. “Well, that’s too bad..." 

Harry stared at Malfoy in disbelief, then said, his voice straining, “Do you KNOW how many people DIED?” 

Malfoy shrugged. Harry considered hitting his head against the wall until he knocked himself unconscious. Finally he sighed, and just said, “Oh my god. Don’t talk to me. Stupidity might be contagious and I don’t want to lose any brain cells to you.” 

“Cells?” Goyle asked Malfoy. “Why’s he talking about a prison now?” 

Harry groaned and walked faster. 

Malfoy obviously didn’t enjoy being told he was an idiot, especially by Harry Potter, so he acted extra nasty towards Harry that week, as if to make up for being nice to him the week before. In the morning as they all woke up, he taunted Harry for his messy, curly hair, and worn down pajamas. As Harry got ready, he bugged Harry about his muggle toothbrush. In the halls and during breakfast, he sneered at Harry and sometimes made little jabs. On the way to class, he even shoved Harry aside with a pointy elbow. The shove was hard, harder than Harry had realized, and he had to struggle slightly to catch his breath again. 

“What happened?” Tracey asked in a low voice as they walked in. At first Harry thought she was asking why Harry was catching his breath, but then she added, “You guys seemed to be getting along fine before.” 

Harry shrugged, unwilling to explain. 

During Potions that week, while Professor Snape’s back was turned, Malfoy threw a little bundle of potions ingredients, all tied up in twine, into Harry’s potion. The potion exploded at once; most of it onto Harry, but some of it hitting Ron as well. It soaked through Harry’s robes and shirt, and he could feel boils quickly forming on his chest, as well as on his face, arms, hands, and neck. 

“Twenty points from Gryffindor and a detention each!” Professor Snape thundered. “Take your bags and head to the hospital wing, both of you.” 

On the way to the hospital wing, Harry’s mind raced. He might be asked to take his shirt off so that Madame Pompfrey would able to properly heal his chest. He had gained a lot of weight since he had arrived at Hogwarts earlier in the year, but he was still abnormally skinny and small for his age. Still, he thought that as long as he made something up about having a fast metabolism, things should be okay. 

They reached the Hospital Wing far too quickly for Harry’s tastes. Madame Pompfrey bustled over to them, took a look at the boils, and pointed each to a different bed to sit down on. “Mr. Weasley, do you only have boils on your hands?” She asked as she looked through a cupboard for something. 

“Just my hands and wrists,” Ron confirmed. 

“Mr. Potter, where do you have boils?” 

“Um.” Harry swallowed, licked his lips. “I’ve got them on my hands, and my face, and the front of my neck… and on my arms and chest.” He almost choked on the last couple of words. 

Madame Pompfrey nodded, and pulled a jars of a strange, whitish looking goo out of the cupboard. “I’ll take care of Mr. Weasley first, as he’ll take less time, if you don’t mind,” Madame Pompfrey said. 

“I don’t mind at all,” Harry just barely managed to say. “No problem.” 

Madame Pompfrey gently spread the white gooey liquid on Ron’s hands, and almost immediately, the boils began to shrink and flatten out, until they were gone completely. Madame Pompfrey smiled at Ron. “That easy, dear.” 

“Thanks,” Ron mumbled. 

“Alright, your turn, Mr. Potter. Please take off your robes.”

Harry slowly shrugged off his outer robes, carefully folding them on the bed. He pulled off his sweater, fiddled with the knot on his tie and spent longer than necessary untying it. And then, too soon, there was only his shirt. He lingered on the buttons, his trembling fingers unable to unhook them as quickly as he would usually be able to. Too soon, the shirt was unbuttoned; Harry didn’t dare go far as to shrug it off. He was suddenly, accutely aware of the scar on his back, from when Dudley had shoved him to the ground, onto a piece of glass, and the dog bite scar, on his inner left arm, where Ripper had bit him. 

Harry didn’t have any other scars, though; no chest or back scars. It wasn’t like the Dursleys abused him; they just pinched him and held back meals sometimes and gave extra chores and things. All of the little punishments didn’t leave marks. It was fine. Harry was fine, and the only thing Harry had to worry about was that Madame Pompfrey might mistake “fine” for… not fine. 

Madame Pompfrey was nerve rackingly silent as she gently rubbed the goo into his hands, then slowly moved up his wrists. Her fingers lingered over his dog bite scar. “I might be able to do something for the scar tissue here,” she mused. “It looks as though it was never really properly cared for, though, so i think you’ll always have a scar there.” 

“Oh, yeah,” Harry laughed awkwardly, then lied through his teeth, saying, “I got bit by a neighborhood dog… but I wasn’t supposed to be out wandering the neighborhood in the first place, so to avoid getting in trouble I just took care of it myself… or tried to. Probably not my greatest idea, in hindsight.” 

“Indeed,” Madame Pompfrey said with a small, actually real chuckle. “I’ll see about what I can do about it once I’ve dealt with your boils.” 

With gentle hands, Madame Pompfrey pushed his shirt off of his shoulders, so she could care for the boils there. Harry was sure she could feel the still slightly too prominent bones in his shoulder, could see the little hollows above his collarbone, significantly deeper than the subtle ones the skinniest of his roommates- Malfoy- had. Harry shivered slightly at her touch, and when he sent Ron a pleading look, sort of like, “oh my god, this so awkward, help me,” Ron looked oddly… worried. 

Harry looked away, embarrassed. Harry didn’t need help, or pity. He was just a little bit skinny. He wasn’t even that much skinnier than anyone else. Madame Pompfrey rubbed the goo onto his chest, and Harry could feel the boils disappearing, but it wasn’t the boils that he was worried about. 

Madame Pompfrey finished off his face and neck, and then put the goo away, leaving Harry to sit awkwardly on the bed, desperately wishing he could put his shirt back on again. She then waved her wand over Harry’s dog bite scar, murmuring an incantation as she did so. Harry could feel a tingling sensation. Then she grabbed another jar of goo, which she spread on Harry’s arm. It was odd, because Harry could actually see as the scar tissue shrunk slightly. 

“Well, Mr. Potter,” she said slowly, “I’ve done everything I can for that scar. There is something else I’d like to talk to you about, however. Mr. Weasley, if you could please wait outside?” 

Ron gave Harry an encouraging nod and headed outside to wait in the hall. Harry gave Ron a weak parting smile, and shifted nervously on the bed. 

“Mr. Potter,” Madame Pompfrey said gingerly, “I doubt that you know about this, but just like muggle doctors like to keep records of their patients, so do healers. And, I’m afraid, I have very little by way of records for you. That is to say, I have no records of any general health checkups.” 

“Does that mean I need to have a general health checkout now?” Harry asked, employing the same, I-am-young-scared-and-nonthreatening voice that he had used on Dumbledore. He even sat on his hands, and swung his legs nervously. 

Madame Pompfrey couldn’t help but melt slightly at his clear nerves. “Not necessarily,” she said, although considering his somewhat alarming skinniness, that might be advisable. “It would be a terrible bother for all of us to have to do all of those checks that your muggle doctor has already done. I sent your aunt an owl asking for your muggle medical records, but she didn’t respond.” 

There was a slightly awkward pause, and then Harry blurted out the first lie that he could think of- “my aunt has a gigantic phobia of owls. All birds, really. But especially owls.” He licked his lips, then elaborated on his lie, saying, “When they sent my Hogwarts letter, she wouldn’t respond, and they had to send Hagrid.”

“Ah,” Madame Pompfrey said. “Well, that is certainly unfortunate. Do you know of any other convenient means by which to contact her?” 

Harry shook his head. “There’s only muggle means, that I can think of.” 

Madame Pompfrey sighed a little. “Well, I suppose that I will have to write up a letter.” She smiled benevolently down on Harry. “It’s not too much fuss. Now, your aunt and uncle are named-” 

“Petal and Marvin Durnley,” Harry lied through his teeth. Madame Pompfrey nodded, and noted them down. 

“You should be able to find them in the phone book, if you want to call them,” Harry added innocently. 

“Well, thank you,” She said with a smile. “Off you trot!” 

Harry nodded and got dressed again, then headed out. “Misplaced paperwork,” he explained to Ron with a casual shrug. 

After the painfully nerve racking trip to the hospital wing, Harry almost completely forgot about detention, but the teachers didn't. About a week after the trip to the hospital wing, a note was delivered to Harry during breakfast. At first Harry worried that it was something to do with the checkup, but it thankfully wasn’t about that. The note read, “Your detention will take place at eleven o'clock tonight. Meet Mr. Filch in the entrance hall.” At eleven o'clock that night, Harry went down to the entrance hall as instructed. Filch was already there -- and so was another student, the pink haired girl who had covered her legs with ink.

“I’m Nymphadora Tonks,” The pink haired girl said. “But you can call me Tonks.”

Filch said roughly, “No need to get acquianted, you’re here to be punished after all… now both of you follow me.” He lit a lamp and lead them outside into the musty, cold darkness. “I bet you'll think twice about breaking a school rule again, won't you, eh?" he said, and then began to reminisce about the days when he could hang students by their wrists. Behind his back, Tonks was making all sorts of silly faces and mouthing what Filch was saying, which made Harry feel a little bit better, but he still couldn’t help but wonder what their punishment would be.

"Is that you, Filch? Hurry up, I want ter get started,” came Hagrid’s familiar voice. Harry’s relief must have showed in his face, because Filch made a nasty sort of face and said, "I suppose you think you'll be enjoying yourself with that oaf? Well, think again, boy -- it's into the forest you're going and I'm much mistaken if you'll all come out in one piece." Harry couldn’t help but shiver a little at Filch’s words, but Tonks gave Harry a reassuring smile that helped a little bit. 

Hagrid came striding toward them out of the dark, Fang at his heel. He was carrying his large crossbow, and a quiver of arrows hung over his shoulder, which did not assure Harry in regards to the safety of the Forbidden Forest. "Abou' time," he said. "I bin waitin' fer half an hour already. Alright, Filch, yeh've done yer bit, I'll take over from here." 

"I'll be back at dawn," said Filch, "for what's left of them," he added nastily, and he turned and started back toward the castle. 

Apparently, detention was going to be looking for what was killing the unicorns. “Now, there’s no need to be scared,” Hagrid said. “There's nothin' that lives in the forest that'll hurt yeh if yer with me or Fang. Keep ter the path, just ter be safe. Right, now, we're gonna split inter two parties an' follow the trail in diff'rent directions. Harry- you come with me. Tonks, you alright bein’ on yer own?”   
Tonks nodded. When they reached a fork in the path, Tonks and Fang took one fork while Harry and Hagrid took the other fork. The walk was eerie. The forest was quiet and dark, except for rays of moonlight sometimes illuminated the silver-blue blood splashed around on the trees and grass. 

“GET BEHIND THAT TREE!" Hagrid shouted suddenly, making Harry violently flinch and quickly scrambled behind the nearby tree, his entire body shaking. Hagrid nocked an arrow onto his crossbow and looked around, ready to fire. Harry tried to breathe shallowly. 

In the quiet of the forest, Harry could hear that something was slithering over dead leaves nearby; he flattened himself against the tree, holding his breath and clenching his fist around his wand in his pocket. 

"There's summat in here that shouldn' be,” Hagrid muttered grimly. “Right, follow me, but careful, now." Harry slowly forced himself out of behind the protection of the tree; his hand felt as though it was glued to his wand with sweat. They walked along slowly, Hagrid’s arrow still nocked on his bow. 

As they didn’t hear anything more or run into any unicorn blood drinking creatures, Harry slowly began to relax again. He followed Hagrid deeper and deeper into the forest; they walked for a little bit more than an hour. As time passed, Harry’s issue became less nerves, and more simply tiredness. Now that the adrenaline of fear had worn off, he found himself becoming almost docile, sleepy. The forest seemed a dreamy blur, sort of like an already half-forgotten nightmare. 

That was, until Tonks sent up a bunch of red sparks. Harry barely saw them through the trees, but Hagrid must have somehow caught sight of them, because he muttered something about Tonks being in trouble, scooped up Harry, and was immediately off sprinting through the forest, Harry cradled in his arms. 

Hagrid made surprisingly quick time, but they had already been walking for about an hour, so it still took a while to get to where Tonks had been, and Tonks was gone by the time they got there. There was only a bloodied, dead unicorn, and an oddly familiar sort of scent hanging in the air, but neither Tonks nor whoever it was who had done it was there. Hagrid looked around, squinting at the little clearing, then spotted some hoofprints and said, "The centaurs musta helped Tonks out.” He started tracking the hoofprints through the forest, still carrying Harry and still moving at that same surprising pace. 

Hagrid and Harry through the trees to see Tonks sitting on a centaur’s back, talking quietly with him. She slid off his back, thanking him profusely. The centaur said something more to her, in a low voice, then turned and cantered back into the depths of the forest. 

Tonks was quiet and somber on the walk back through the forest. Hagrid talked reassuringly, but Tonks didn’t laugh or make jokes like she had been doing earlier. After Hagrid left the two of them in the entrance hall, Tonks grabbed Harry’s shoulder. “I need to talk to you,” she said seriously. 

“Um,” Harry said, staring at her hand on his shoulder. She dropped it, then lowered her voice, saying, “The centaurs think that the thing killing the unicorns is You Know Who, and frankly, I agree. The centaurs implied there was something You Know Who could do at Hogwarts, that would grant him immortality… I think it may be killi- um.” Tonks cut herself off, and shook her head. “I want you to be really careful. I’m going to tell Professor Dumbledore and everything, but… don’t go wandering out alone, especially not at night. Be careful, okay? And if you need anything, if you feel unsafe, you can always come to me, okay?” 

Harry just stared at her a little dazedly for a moment, but when she made it clear she wasn’t leaving until he acknowledged what she had said, he nodded. “Okay,” he said weakly. 

Harry went to bed, but he didn’t sleep. He just sat on his bed, hugging his knees to his chest and shaking a little bit, his mind racing a hundred miles an hour. The thing that Voldemort wanted… that was the Stone, doubtlessly. Had the troll been from Voldemort? Had Voldemort been trying to kill him? Harry shuddered at the thought. 

“Harry?” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk asked, rubbing her cool, scaley body up against him. “Are you okay? What’s going on?” 

Usually explaining his problems to Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk made them seem stronger, but tonight it didn’t really work. Harry tried to explain the situation as best he could anyway. 

“I’m sssorry,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk said at last. “But I’ll protect you!” She added, puffing up her chest. “I’m very poisssonousss…” she seemed to see that this wasn’t making Harry feel as much better as she would like. Harry started crying quietly, not wanting to wake up his roommates. “I’m sssorry,” she hissed very softly, licking at his tears. She felt like the cool side of a pillow against his hot, tear-stained face. “I’m sssorry…” 

“It’sss okay,” Harry murmured. “It’sss not your fault…” 

Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk wrapped herself around Harry’s shoulders and neck like a snake scarf, and just comforted him like that until at last, sniffling and hiccuping quietly, he was able to stop crying. 

“Can you tell me a ssstory,” Harry pleaded. “To help me get to sssleep?” 

“Well,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk said slowly after a while, “There'sss thisss crazy human I sssaw yesssterday. He rubsss his pawsss in dirt he keepsss in little walled thingsss, and he feedsss hisss fluffy animal dead mice. Probably because they are too lazy to catch mice themssselvesss,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk addded scornfully. 

Harry could feel himself already relaxing, the tension in his shoulders unwinding as Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk continued her story. It was almost four am when Harry managed to go sleep, but without Ssslschhshkh'lsh'hhk's help, he probably wouldn't have slept at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk snuggled up against her human. The thing her human called a "terrarium" was warmer, but Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk wanted to make sure that her human was completely safe. Her human may be scared, but he didn't realize how strong and terrifying she was. She wasn't like those fluffy things that needed to have their human bring them mice; Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hunted her own food, and she would similarly hunt anyone who dared hurt or even annoy her human.


	14. chokehold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things go downhill. Also down through the trapdoor.

The evidence of Harry’s lack of sleep was immediately apparent. While he knotted his tie, he could feel Blaise’s eyes on him. His under eyes, which always had dark circles, now were adorned with huge bags. Usually his darker skin tone as least partially disguised his dark circles, or at least made them not as obvious as they were on other people, but now everyone could tell at one glance that Harry had gotten approximately three hours of sleep the night before. 

“Madame Pompfrey has sleeping potions,” Blaise offered lightly. 

Harry shook his head, muttering something about being fine. 

“At least put up a glamour, if you don’t want people to acknowledge it,” Blaise said, the very slightest note of frustration in his voice as he tied his own tie. 

Harry shrugged. “I don’t know any,” he said finally, splashing his face with cold water. 

Blaise led Harry through the steps of a simple glamour. Harry parroted them back, then cast it on his face, and smiled weakly at the result. “Thanks,” he said with a little nod. 

Blaise nodded back, then exited the bathroom. 

Harry could barely eat breakfast, either. He picked at his eggs and nibbled at his bacon. The sweet smell of maple syrup made him feel sick. He finally ended up eating a few bites of fruit salad and then leaving. 

Harry had considered telling his friends about Tonks’ revelation, but he had ended up deciding against it. There was no way he wanted to put them in any danger, and telling them would probably just make them miserable and worried, just like he was. 

Instead, Harry tried to act like he was fine, and everything was normal. But, as nice as it was seeing his friends being happy, it also made Harry feel worse. He felt so disconnected from them. He couldn’t tell them what was upsetting him, but he also couldn’t seem to force himself to act happy and pretend to be like them. Even though he had been so worried about exams before, they seemed like a much pettier set of worries than Voldemort. Later, during his free time, his thoughts and worries often ate him alive, and then he would join Hermione and Neville in their slightly frantic studying, just to avoid the thoughts plaguing him. 

Harry’s stomach was almost constantly knotted with worry. He had to check that Fluffy was still barking behind the door every day, otherwise for that entire day he would be utterly consumed with stress. He grew paranoid, and flinched at every little noise. He didn’t eat or sleep as much as he should; classes passed in a haze. He started having trouble turning in homework. He could see Tracey eyeing him in class sometimes, but she didn’t comment.

It took Hermione a while to notice that something was wrong with her friend, but once she did she started asking him what it was that was going on, bugging him to eat more, and generally being a nusiance. Unwilling to confide in Hermione, Harry stopped studying with her as much, then at all. For a while, he stopped doing homework completely, even for Potions. When Professor Snape viciously dug into him, Harry barely even cared. Annoyed, Professor Snape assigned him several detentions. 

During detention, Harry just moved through the motions. He carried each cauldron in trembling hands. He scrubbed slowly, methodically. His eyes half-closed, and he almost dozed off, even though he was standing. He was moving more slowly than usual, and he could tell that Professor Snape wasn’t happy with him, but he couldn’t seem to make himself speed up. 

Days inched by. Harry lived for the few snippets of time when he felt okay or even good- talking to Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk, when he was engrossed in Astronomy, or when he was otherwise successfully distracted. Harry took things a little at a time- just one class, then another, then another, until Harry had gotten through all of his classes. Just one day, until the next was over. Just one week, until it was time for the next. 

It at once felt it took a painfully long time, and yet at the same time a surprisingly short one, to get to exam time. Exams themselves were miserable; it was boiling hot, especially in the large classroom where they did their written papers. Harry almost drowsed off several times over his exam papers, but he forced himself to stay awake. He was sure later that he had bombed his written exams, but there was nothing for it; he could only hope to do better on the practicals. 

In Charms, they were called into class one at a time to see if they could make a pineapple tapdance across a desk. Harry’s tripped a few times, but he thought overall he had at least done decently. Harry heard Neville talking nervously to Hermione about how he had done, but Harry didn’t join them.

In Transfiguration, they had to turn a mouse into a snuffbox, and in Potions, they were expected to make a Forgetfulness potion. Harry thought this was sort of ironic, as what he really needed was a remembering potion, in order to remember all the details of how to make a Forgetfulness potion. 

When the very last exam was over, Harry was very relieved. Not only was he done with exams, now that exams were out of the way, he wouldn’t have very much of school left. As much as he hated the Dursleys, at least at the Dursleys he wouldn’t have to be fearing for his life, and anyhow, now that Harry formally knew some magic, he thought it would be loads better; they’d be too terrified to make things very miserable for him. 

Harry was sure his friends were off somewhere talking altogether without him. Hermione was probably nervously reviewing her answers and making Neville more nervous. Harry imagined Ron grumbling about Hermione reviewing; Parvati would be talking about her summer plans excitedly, and Padma probably reassuring Hermione and Neville. He longed to try to find them, and talk with them, but he’d been ignoring them for a while now, and he was certain they wouldn’t want to be friends with him anymore.

So instead, Harry went down to Hagrid’s straight off; he’d been doing that a lot recently, as Hagrid didn’t bug him if he was feeling alright, only offered him tea and companionable quiet, or light conversation if that’s what Harry felt like. When Harry came down the path, Hagrid was sitting in an armchair outside his house, shelling peas into a large bowl. As Harry approached, he smiled and asked if Harry fancied some tea. 

“Yes please,” Harry said. “I can help you shell peas, if you like.”

Soon they were sitting in comfortable silence, shelling peas. Harry took a sip of tea every few peas, and Hagrid was whistling a funny tune that Harry rather liked. Harry was just gathering his courage to ask Hagrid if he could teach Harry to whistle, when Hagrid said, “I’ve bin meaning ta tell yeh, Charlie wrote back and would yeh believe it, Norbert’s really Norberta! ” He chuckled, shaking his shaggy head. "He's- I mean she's- doin' well, Charlie says. O' course, I miss her, but it's good to know at least that she's goin' on strong." He sniffed a little.

Harry gave an appropriate answering hum. “I’ve been wondering,” He said after a few beats, “How’d you get her, anyway?” He added quickly, “Not that I’m interesting in having a dragon as a pet or breaking the law or anything.”

“Don’ worry, I know that,” Hagrid chuckled. “Well, I won her. I beat a fella at cards. There are an awful lotta odd folk at the Hog’s Head- that’s the pub down in the village. I’ve got a dozen or so odd stories from or about folk I met there.” He hummed thoughtfully. “Mighta bin a dragon dealer, I s’pose. I never saw his face, he kept his hood up…"

Harry was getting the oddest feeling. He was probably just paranoid, but… “He just gave you a dragon?” He trailed off, brow furrowing slightly. 

“Nah, not just like that… he was real responsible about it. Wanted to make sure I was qualified. He asked what I did, asked a bit about the sorta creatures I took after... after Fluffy, a dragon would be easy, I told him, and he knew he could trust me with his egg." Hagrid smiled proudly. 

Harry felt a chill run down his spine, like someone had dropped a handful of snow down the back of his robes. "And did he -- did he seem interested in Fluffy?" Harry asked.

"Well -- yeah -- how many three-headed dogs d'yeh meet, even around Hogwarts? So I told him, Fluffy's a piece o' cake if yeh know how to calm him down, jus' play him a bit o' music an' he'll go straight off ter sleep --" Hagrid stopped speaking abruptly, looking horrified. 

Harry quickly gulped down the last of his tea. “Thanks loads, Hagrid!” He called as he hurried off. 

“Hey -- where're yeh goin'? Harry?"

“Sorry for leaving so abruptly, I’ll make it up to you, I promise!” Harry called over his shoulder, hurrying up to the castle. His mind was racing. The unicorn blood, the dead unicorns… the stranger knew how to get past Fluffy… probably the Stone was fine, but now he was feeling extra nervous, his heart pounding quickly. He just needed to check, just to be absolutely certain. 

Harry hurried down the familiar route, his shoes slapping the floor rhythmically. He pressed his ear right up to the door, held his breath to hear better. Through the thick oaken door, he could hear music, and the deep breaths of a sleeping dog. Harry could feel his heart stop for a split second, then begin pounding again, much more quickly than before. 

Harry needed to get in, but when he tried the knob, it was of course locked tightly, and the door was made out of thick, sturdy oak. He remembered that time he had managed to budge his cupboard’s lock with his mind, so he decided he would try to do that again. He allowed his desperation, his panic, to gather and then bubble over. Open, he thought as hard as he could, envisioning the door swinging open invitingly. Openopenopen, please please open, please please...

Slowly, very slowly, the lock clicked, and the door swung open. Harry staggered on his feet as he could feel the energy he had been siphoning into his magic leave him; he was already tired from lack of the sleep, and the long day of exams, but now he felt as though he was going to collapse right here. But Harry couldn’t; he didn’t have time. Instead, pushing himself off the wall, he stumbled inside. 

Fluffy was sleeping in the corner, next to a harp which was playing itself. In the center of the room was the trapdoor, left wide open. Harry couldn’t see what was under the trapdoor; it looked like a huge, gaping void, or the throat of a great jet black beast. Harry shivered looking down inside it; he could feel cool, wet air, with the littlest hint of a breeze and a loamy scent, rising through the hole. The smell was pleasent, but Harry was still nervous; what if it was a drop intended to kill the person trying to find their way through. 

Harry looked around the room slowly, and then his gaze landed on a huge iron dog bowl, lying in one corner. He grabbed it, and then carefully dropped it through the hole, and then counted the seconds until he heard a muffled sort of “clang” noise. It seemed like a long fall to Harry, but he had no idea how many seconds it took for something to fall a meter, so he had no idea exactly how long. 

Harry was getting less and less sure of this every moment now. He had no supplies except his wand, and no idea what he was going to be up against. He was trying to think of what he should do, when he heard the harp music begin to trail off, and Fluffy start stirring. One of Fluffy’s heads began sniffing towards him sleepily, and Harry flinched away, tripped over himself, and fell down, down, down, through the cool wet air- until he suddenly hit something squishy. 

Harry fell on his side, with his hand with his wand in it under him. Although he was tempted to just lay there for a moment, he tried to spring up- only to find that his arm was already wrapped tightly with the plant. Harry tried to yank himself out, struggling and trying to rip it off his arm, but it only grew around more of his body, tightening more and more. Because Harry had fallen on his side, he was already pretty well bound up. 

“HELP!” He screamed hoarsely, as loud as he could. His voice was muffled; with his hands bound up in tendrils, he had been unable to prevent the plant from winding around his throat. “DIFFINDO!” He tried to move his wand in the wand motions, but the plant prevented him. “HELP! ANYONE? HELP!” He choked, unable to draw full breaths with the tendrils around his throat slowly tightening. The world was starting to get dull and hazy. 

Or it was- until suddenly, Harry could feel a sort of licking heat, not touching his skin but still too close for comfort. He gasped, eyes opening quickly, and began to try to squirm away from the heat. The plant was slowly, reluctantly, loosening its grip, but as it was doing so, the heat was getting closer and closer. Harry could smell the smoke, feel it filling his lungs, taking the space that should be filled with air. 

And then, suddenly, he was yanked into the air, out of the mess of licking fire and grasping plant. He was thrown to the ground roughly, and laid there, for a moment, coughing and trying to catch his breath. But when he opened his eyes and tried to sit up, he saw that there was a wand tip to his throat . 

Professor Quirrel was staring down at him. In class, when he’d demonstrated spells at all, his wandwork had been slow and a little bit clumsy, but now his hand was perfectly steady. His meek demeanor was gone as well. The Professor Quirrel that Harry had known had had a habit of nervously blinking when making eye contact, but now Professor Quirrel was staring him down, a hint of disdain on his face. The look in his eyes made Harry feel like a mouse before a hawk. Harry was transfixed, unable to move under the weight of that look. 

"I wondered whether I'd be meeting you here, Potter,” Professor Quirrel said, gesturing with his wand to indicate that Harry should stand. 

“You- what?” Harry said, stumbling to his feet. His hands were shaking, so he stuffed them into the pockets of his singed robes. 

Professor Quirrel took another long look at Harry; Harry blinked tiredly back up at him, confused beyond belief. “Perhaps you are more Slytherin than I had assumed,” Professor Quirrel said finally, in a low, thoughtful voice. He glanced at the burnt remains of the plant that had cushioned Harry’s fall, then at Harry again. “Or perhaps not.” He gave Harry a nasty little prod. “Come along, Potter.” 

Harry walked down the stone passageway, Quirrel’s wand digging painfully into his back. Harry’s mind was racing, trying to figure out what was going on, what to do. He felt like a gigantic fool now- he should have planned better, instead of just rushing into things with no idea what he was doing. 

At the end of the passageway was a chamber with a high ceiling, full of light, which danced across loads of small, vividly colored birds whizzing about. At the end of the chamber was a wooden door. Up against the near wall were several broomsticks. 

“Now, Potter,” Quirrel said, “get on one of those brooms and catch the key. It should be a big key, rather old-fashioned, possibly silver.” 

Harry stared at him in confusion. “Catch… the key?” 

Professor Quirrel sighed in a long suffering manner and gestured at the birds. “Those are keys. You want a large, old fashioned, silver key. Grab any that you think might work.” 

Harry nodded and started towards the brooms. As he picked one out, his mind reviewed how they’d been taught to kick off, steer, and accelerate back in Flying. Harry kicked off and soared right into the thickest swarm of keys. Instead of wasting his energy dipping and weaving after random keys, he waited a few moments, until he suddenly caught sight of a large, silver key with brilliant blue wings. Harry ducked and weaved as he followed it, almost catching it several times, but each time allowing it to just barely slip through his fingers. 

It was only when the key got close enough to the passageway that Harry forced his exhausted body to move into higher gear. He grabbed the key out of the air, and then flattened himself to the broom, accelerating as fast as he could as he sped down the passageway. On a broom, he could go back up through the trapdoor, safely avoid Fluffy… hopefully, Harry would be able to make it back out of the third floor corridor, and leave Professor Qurriel trapped, unable to get through the rest of the defenses because of the missing ring. 

“Petrificus Totalus!” Professor Quirrel called from somewhere behind him. Harry could feel his limbs stiffening, and his control over them diminishing to nothing; he fell over off his broom. Harry hit the ground hard, with the brunt of his weight going onto his left arm. There was an ugly snapping noise, and Harry’s arm began to hurt awfully. “Finite Incantateum! Up, Potter, and hand me the key!” 

Harry automatically tried to push himself to his feet with both of his arms, and choked on a strangled cry at the pain in his arm. Scowling, Professor Quirrel pointed his wand at Harry, and Harry flinched away as far as he could, bracing himself for the worst. “Imperio!” 

Suddenly, the pain was gone. Everything was gone- all of Harry’s worries and half-baked schemes at escapes just melted away. All that was left was a vague sort of happiness, sort of like the sleepy happiness of waking up and realizing that it’s Saturday. There was a voice in Harry’s head, or not exactly a voice, more like a gently coaxing impulse. Harry obeyed it without even fully registering what was happening; he walked back down the corridor, handed Quirrel the key, and then followed Quirrel into the next room. 

The next room was a gigantic chessboard. Harry moved where he was told, and then followed into the room after that, which held a huge troll. Somewhere beneath the haze of happiness, Harry was terrified, but the feeling was mostly muffled by the fog. He simply stood there as Professor Quirrel killed the troll; the curse prevented him from even flinching. 

In the next room, Professor Quirrel bent over a row of oddly shaped bottles, muttering to himself a little, before grabbing one bottle. He drank it in one gulp, then walked through the flames, leaving Harry behind, standing stiffly. 

A few minutes later, Harry was compelled by the curse to walk up, grab a certain bottle, and drink it all up in one gulp, and walk straight into the black flames. Beneath the fog, Harry’s mind was frantically screaming, but Harry could only watch distantly as he walked through the black flames- thankfully unscathed. 

Quirrel released the curse, and all of Harry’s pain and exhaustion came rushing back almost at once. He fell to the ground, clutching his arm, which was hurting even more than before, probably from when he had used it under the Imperius curse. 

Quirrel’s nose wrinkled a little as he looked down at Harry in disgust; he snapped his fingers and ropes sprang into existence, wrapping themselves tightly around Harry. The sensation made Harry think of the plant from earlier, wrapping Harry up in order to choke him, but the ropes simply bound him, and stopped tightening past a certain point. 

“Wait quietly, Potter. I need to examine this interesting mirror,” Quirrel said rather condescendingly. He turned back towards a tall mirror, which Harry realized was the Mirror of Erised. Professor Quirrel began to tap his wand away at it, muttering to himself. 

The only thing that occurred to Harry was to try to distract him by talking. Villains in Dudley’s comic books had always liked talking about their evil accomplishments; maybe Professor Quirrel was the same way?

“Was it you with the troll?” He blurted out. 

“Yes,” Quirrel said with a chuckle, but didn’t elaborate further. He began to slowly circle around the mirror, looking at it closely. 

“What about- the unicorn blood,” Harry said. “Was that you?” 

Quirrel seemed less amused now. “My master,” He said quietly, “requires more sustenance than I can provide him…” 

My master… was Quirrel talking about Voldemort? Harry flinched back as far as he could, constrained by ropes he was. 

Quirrel returned his attention to the mirror. "I don't understand... is the Stone inside the mirror? Should I break it?" 

Harry was pretty sure the mirror was necessary for getting the Stone; he was hoping that maybe he could find a way to trick Quirrel into breaking it, but Harry was too tired to come up with anything that could work. 

Quirrell was still mumbling to himself, getting more and more frustrated. "Help me, Master!" 

"Use the boy... Use the boy..." An odd, hissing voice said, seeming to come from Quirrel himself. 

Quirrel clapped his hands, releasing Harry from the ropes. "Come here," Quirrell repeated. "Look in the mirror and tell me what you see." 

Harry stepped in front of the mirror. He saw his reflection, pale and scared-looking, and behind him- his family, just as he had seen before. His mom was glaring fiercely right at Quirrel, as was his dad. The tea addict was whispering quickly in mirror-Harry’s ear. Mirror-Harry nodded, and then turned back to real Harry with a grin. Mirror-Harry pulled a large, crimson stone out of his pocket, showed it to Harry, then slipped the Stone back into his pocket- at the same time, Harry felt the weight of the Stone within his own pocket. 

“What do you see?” Professor Quirrel asked. 

“My parents,” Harry said quietly, unable to think of a real lie in time. “My family.” 

“He lies,” the high, hissing voice said. 

“What did you really just see, Potter?” Quirrel asked, a note of something dangerous in his voice, now. 

“I have the Stone,” Harry blurted. 

“Do you?” Quirrel said. “Well, come and give it to me.” 

Harry slowly approached, hands shaking. When he was right up to Quirrel, he held out the Stone as if to give it to Quirrel- and then used it to bash at Quirrel’s head as hard as he could. 

“YOU LITTLE BRAT,” Quirrel howled, one hand to his bleeding head. He tackled Harry, getting his hands around Harry’s neck. Harry’s scar felt as though it was splitting his head open, and yet Quirrel was screaming in agony. Purely by instinct, Harry reached up and grabbed Professor Quirrel’s face, clinging on as hard as he could, even as he felt the skin burning and blistering beneath his fingers… Quirrel was trying to throw him off, and Harry stubbornly clinging on with all of the strength he had remaining, and somewhere were Voldemort’s high screams ordering Quirrel to kill Harry… the pain was unbelievable, the world was going white…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tcf!Harry isn't as close with Ron and Hermione as in canon, and Harry has a lot of trouble asking for help (if he ever does at all), so I can't really see Harry telling his friends. In canon, not only was he closer with Ron and Hermione, they were also more involved with his dangerous adventures, and therefore they would have probably figured at least some of what was going on, anyway. 
> 
> Charlie and Hagrid keep on corresponding. Some future summer, Charlie even asks Hagrid to come visit the Dragon Reserve with him. Norberta doesn't seem to remember Hagrid, but Hagrid doesn't mind. 
> 
> Professor Quirrel is assuming that Harry came down into the third floor corridor to try to steal the Stone himself, but failing quite miserably at it. He's saying Harry is very Slytherin for being ambitious enough to try to steal the Stone, but not very Slytherin for being so brash as to jump in without any preparation. 
> 
> As we're getting closer and closer to the end of first year, I'm wondering if I should write the entire story just under "those cunning folks" or should I have each year be a new work. Having everything in one work would probably be more convenient, but it would also mean I can't use the titles I thought up for each book, and it might be kind of clunky to work with... what do you guys think?
> 
> Also!! Thank you guys so much for 400 kudos. I'm honestly blown away. When I started writing this story, I didn't think it would get so much attention, or that people would like as much as they seem to. You guys' comments and input are what keep inspiring me to write more. Anyway... thanks. <3


	15. promises and blame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry has to face the consequences of what happened.

The light wasn’t brilliant snow white anymore. It was more like a sort of gentle, creamy off white. The nasty smell of burnt flesh and garlic was gone, and the ground felt soft and comfortable. In fact, now that Harry thought about it… it wasn’t the ground that Harry was lying on. 

Harry turned his head and saw Padma and Parvati sitting next to his bed. Parvati was reading the newest divination zine and Padma was leafing through the book of poetry by e.e. cummings that Harry had given to her. Behind them was a table, covered with an assortment of candy and cards. 

“Parvati!” Padma gasped, realizing Harry was awake. 

“I’ll go tell Madam Pompfrey,” Parvati said, rushing out of the room. “I’m so glad you’re okay, Harry! You’ve got to tell all of us exactly what happened, okay!” 

“What- what?” Harry asked, trying to sit up. “Did- did Quirrel get the Stone?” 

“Lay back down, Harry,” Padma said. “You don’t want to tire yourself out. Madam Pompfrey will be here soon.” 

Madam Pompfrey bustled in, looking harassed. She carried an entire tray of potions in her arms, which she set down on the little bit of room left on the table. “Out! Out!” She said, making shooing motions at Parvati and Padma. 

“Please, we just want to talk to Harry,” Parvati tried. 

“He needs rest,” Madam Pompfrey said. “And I need to talk to him. Now get out.” 

Padma pulled Parvati out of the room. 

Madam Pompfrey sat down on the edge of Harry’s bed with a rather stern expression on her face, an action that made him, understandably, quite nervous. Had Quirrell gotten the Stone? Harry wondered anxiously. Or had Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk died? Was Harry going to be expelled for going into the third floor corridor? 

“Following your entrance to the hospital wing,” Madam Pompfrey said slowly, “I was obliged to do a diagnostic scan on you, in order to see the full extent of your injuries.” 

Harry felt a literal stab of panic in his chest, like he had been skewered with a sword. He stared at Madam Pompfrey, completely still. 

“Mr. Potter- Harry...” Madam Pompfrey’s voice was painfully gentle. Harry fixed his gaze on the ceiling, feeling his eyes prickle with tears that he stubbornly bit back. He wasn’t sure if he could lie his way out of this one. 

“Harry,” Madam Pompfrey began again, seeming a little bit choked up herself, “you know that you can come to the professors with any issue you might be having, don’t you? I know Severus may seem harsh a times, but he does care about the well being of each and every one of his students.” 

Harry just gazed at Madam Pompfrey in confusion, surprised at how upset she seemed to be. And talking about Snape caring about his well being? Ha. Madam Pompfrey must, he thought, be a real bleeding heart to think that the Dursleys' treatment of him was a problem. He was fine. He didn’t need any help. 

Madam Pompfrey sighed heavily. “I know starving yourself may... give yourself a sense of... control, but ultimately, you and your body lose,” Madam Pompfrey said awkwardly. “You need that food; the nutrients in your food are immensely important for your growth. If you continue to starve yourself, you may permanently stunt your development.” 

Harry stared at Madam Pompfrey in shock. She thought that Harry’s state was intentional? That he wanted to be like this? “I- it’s true that I’ve not been eating much the last few- the last few months,” Harry finally choked out. “But… it’s just because, it’s been really… I’ve been really- stressed. It’s hard to eat. My stomach… I just can’t eat. It’s not that I don’t want to… but when I eat too much, I would… I would sometimes throw it up from… stress, I guess.” 

Madam Pompfrey made a thoughtful “hmm” noise. “The diagnostic showed that you have been nutrient deprived for quite some time,” she said at last. 

Harry looked at his hands, which were tightly wrapped around each other, and shaking. “I don’t know, Madam Pompfrey,” he finally said, softly. “At- at home, we- we never really eat dinner as a family... and my- my cousin always eats the good food before I get a chance. I’m a really picky eater, too… I know its bratty, but if I don’t like what we have, I just don’t eat. ” 

Madam Pompfrey just looked at Harry a long moment, looking slightly skeptical, but finally she nodded, seeming to decide that he was telling the truth. “In that case,” she said slowly, “I will prescribe some stomach-settling and nutrient potions for your remaining stay at Hogwarts. You won’t be able to take potions home to your magicalless life, but once your aunt and uncle reply to my letter, I can arrange for your muggle doctor to prescribe something for you over the summer. Does that sound good?” 

“Yeah,” Harry nodded. Internally, he was worried. When would she realize that Harry had given her false names? What would happen? Would she manage to figure out the Dursleys’ real address? The Dursleys would be so angry to be bugged about Harry… Harry could just imagine the Dursleys complaining about it that summer. “One of those freaks thinks that the boy isn’t getting enough to eat! We feed and clothe the boy, even though he’s ungrateful and unhelpful, and he dares to complain to the freaks about us? I’ll show him what ‘hungry’ means!” 

Or maybe it would come out to the rest of the school. Harry felt his stomach churning as he imagined Draco Malfoy’s smug smirk, the way his nose would wrinkle as he began to laugh cruelly. “Even your relatives hate you!” Hermione Granger would make a pitying, slightly condescending face. Ron’s nose would wrinkle and he would say, “Mate, even I have it better than you- I may be poor but at least my parents give a shit about me…” Even Padma and Neville, who were so kind, would think worse of him- they would realize that he was weak and unlovable. They would decide to stop being friends with him, and… 

“Harry?” Madam Pompfrey asked. 

“Sorry, I was just thinking…” Harry shook his head, then changed the subject to the first thing he could think of. “What happened to my arm? I could have sworn I broke it…” 

“I fixed it,” Madam Pompfrey explained with a small smile. “All it required was a simple spell.” 

“Wow,” Harry said, poking his arm. “Thank you.” 

She gave him a nod. “Aside from your broken arm and low nutrition, you also had first and second degree burns, as well as severe magical exhaustion. I’ll be keeping you here until your magical core replenishes itself, and, until your burns heal, will be changing the bandages for you. Please do not remove or adjust them. If you need anything, you can hit this bell and I will notified.” She indicated a bell on his bedside. “In the meantime, try to rest and relax.” 

Harry nodded. He rolled over and started to get sleepy immediately, he was so tired. It was only when he was half asleep that he realized that he still didn’t know what exactly had happened to Professor Quirrell. 

Professor Quirrell… Professor Quirrell was staring into him with that intense gaze. The troll. A cauldron in his shaking arms. The noise as his arm broke. The keys were all attacking his face. He was reaching out to touch the mirror, and his mother’s face began to burn at his touch… 

There was something gold right up above him. Albus Dumbledore’s glasses. Harry blinked sleepily. Albus Dumbledore was sitting in the same chair Parvati had occupied, he saw.

"Good morning, Harry," said Dumbledore, smiling down at Harry. Harry stared back up at him sleepily. 

“The-the Stone?” He asked finally, around his bone dry stone. 

“Quirrel does not have the Stone,” Professor Dumbledore said calmly. He sat, waiting, Harry realized, for more questions, but Harry didn’t feel inclined to ask any. Finally Dumbledore said, “the Stone has been destroyed." 

“Did- did I crush it by accident or something?” Harry said. “What about Nicolas Flamel?” 

"Oh, you know about Nicolas?" said Dumbledore, sounding, oddly, delighted. "Don’t worry, the destruction of the stone was entirely intentional… Nicolas and I have had a little chat, and agreed it's all for the best." Harry couldn’t help that note that “had a little chat” sounded like a mobster in a movie’s way of saying “threatened with a lot of painful things until he agreed”. Not that he thought Dumbledore would do that. Probably. 

"But that means he and his wife will die, won't they?" Harry blurted out in surprise.

"They have enough Elixir stored to set their affairs in order and then, yes, they will die." Dumbledore sighed thoughtfully, though not sadly. "To one as young as you, I'm sure it seems incredible, but to Nicolas and Perenelle, it really is like going to bed after a very, very long day.” He began to natter on about the next great adventure, which all sounded like floral, poetic bullshit to Harry. 

“I suppose you are wondering how you got here,” Professor Dumbledore said thoughtfully. “Well, as I was in London, when the wards for the third floor corridor went off, and so it was the Deputy Headmistress, Professor McGonagall, who was notified. She managed to just pull Quirrell off you in time… She feared she may have been too late…” 

“I’d prefer not to talk about it,” Harry finally choked out, hands knotted in his sheets. 

Professor Dumbledore nodded solemnly. “Do you have any more questions, my boy?” 

“He’s- he’s going to come back, isn’t he?” Harry blurted suddenly, surprising himself. “Vold- You Know Who is going to come back, even though the Stone is gone.” 

"Call him Voldemort, Harry. Always use the proper name for things. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself." 

"Yessir,” Harry mumbled. “Will… Voldemort come back?” 

"Yes,” Dumbledore said, looking older than usual. “He is not truly alive, so therefore, he cannot be killed. Harry, while you may only have delayed his return to power, it will merely take someone else who is prepared to fight what seems a losing battle next time -- and if he is delayed again, and again, why, he may never return to power."

Harry nodded, but he didn’t like the sound of what Dumbledore said. It sounded to him like Dumbledore was saying that Voldemort would keep coming back, and Harry would have to keep risking his life, over and over again until Voldemort finally succeeded in killing Harry… maybe the phrasing implied it would be someone else, but who else would do it? None of the teachers had realized what was going on with Quirrell… And just letting Voldemort come back, over and over again, and then have Harry fight back to delay him each time, seemed like a terrible game of whack-a-mole, not a real solution. 

"But why couldn't Quirrell touch me?" Harry asked. 

"Your mother died to save you. If there is one thing Voldemort cannot understand, it is love…” 

Harry nodded along. His eyes starting getting wet, and Dumbledore politely became immensely interested in something out the window as Harry wiped his wet eyes. 

“I’m very tired,” Harry said at last, although in truth he mostly wanted Dumbledore to be gone, so he could cry in peace. He wished he was in his dorm, with Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk to comfort him…

Harry rolled over to sleep. He dreamed he was in the Slytherin Common Room. Quirrel tried to tug the Stone from his hands, but Harry reached up and grabbed his face. Quirrel screamed in heartrending agony, and as he did, the gentle Slytherin greens and blacks and dim lighting of the Slytherin Common Room quickly burnt away to reveal a painfully bright, completely white room. Harry was burning too, now, and snow white tendrils were wrapping over him, choking him slowly as he tried to escape. He managed to take a few steps. Through a white door he saw the living room of number four, privet drive; Aunt Petunia’s harsh, shrill voice called for him. 

There was a corner of the room that still looked like the Slytherin common room; he leaped towards it, and when his hand touched it, the room turned back to what it should be. Harry jumped through the window into the lake; the cool, murky water soothed his burns. Hermione sat at the bottom of the lake bed, reading. Her hair was lifted upward by ocean currents; she slowly turned to look at Harry, and her mouth curled up into a faux smile that showed long, pointed mermaid teeth. 

“We were never really friends,” She said. Her hair waved slowly. Her teeth glimmered in a beam of light that barely managed to reach the dim, briny depths. 

Harry woke up, ate some food (he wanted to eat some of the sweets people had given him, but Madam Pompfrey wouldn’t allow it) and promptly went back to sleep. 

Harry woke to find himself standing before the hole. The beast’s long throat smelled of rotting meat, and it was lined with teeth. As Harry stared down into the throat, he thought he could see a planet impaled on one of the teeth lining its throat. The beast had swallowed entire galaxies, he knew. 

Harry dove. The teeth scratched him almost to shreds on the way down. He stood now in the chest of the beast. He could see the beating heart. It was made out of the same stuff as the Stone, scarlet red with golden lines shot through it like ichor-pumping veins. 

The mirror was in the corner. Though it much bigger and grander than he remembered it, he knew it was the mirror at once. Harry walked to it and saw his family, all looking oddly stylized, like beautiful paintings. None of them moved. 

Lily Evans was dressed in long, flowing white robes. Her curly red hair, filled with lilies, literally defied gravity. Her emerald green eyes glistened with heavenly light. 

James Potter had huge, gleaming antlers sprouting out of his head. He carried a crossbow like Hagrid’s over one shoulder. He wore scarlet and gold. 

The tea addict had a halo of books floating around him. One book floated just over his fingertips. The pages flipped slowly. He wore a well tailored suit. A dark shadow peered over his shoulder. 

The leather jacket man had a storm cloud flickering over his head. Bolts of lightning shot down around him. His ears were studded with piercings. His bare chest was covered in tattoos. A constellation Harry for some reason couldn’t recognize was tattooed in starlight on his throat. He had huge dog ears sprouting up from his head. 

Harry looked down at himself and saw he looked shorter, skinnier and dirtier than usual. The dog bite was fresh; blood leaked out of it slowly. Harry could feel blood dripping down his face from his lightning bolt scar. 

Harry finally woke up for good. He was still tired and sore, but at least talking for more than twenty minutes didn’t tire him out so much he ended up going right back to sleep afterwards. 

Harry wasn’t sure being awake was much better than being asleep. Harry didn’t have much to do. He ended up writing down his dreams- Parvati was always encouraging them to write down weird dreams so she could interpret them, and although Harry wasn’t sure about their friendship, he had gotten into his habit- and trying to doodle what he had seen. Harry discovered he was a very bad artist, and that people were awfully hard to draw. 

On the third day since Harry had really woken up, Madam Pompfrey let slip that his friends had been trying to get in to talk to him for a good long while, now. With a carefully calculated mixture of pleading, cajoling, bargaining, persuading and pouting, Harry managed to get Madam Pompfrey to allow his friends in. 

"Harry!" Hermione looked ready to hug the living daylights out of him, but she held herself together. "Oh, Harry, we were so, so worried -- Dumbledore thought that--"  
"The whole school's talking about it," Ron said eagerly. "What really happened?"

“I brought Sss- your snake,” Padma said, rather redundantly as Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk was wrapped pretty obviously around her shoulders. “Madam Pompfrey says Ss- she can’t stay here very long.” She mouthed noiselessly at Harry, “Don’t use Parseltongue, okay?” 

Harry nodded, but still eagerly held out his arms for his friend. The feeling of Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk’s cool scales on his skin was amazing. “You ssshould have let me come with you,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed as she butted at Harry’s hand, eager for a petting. “I would have protected you…” 

Harry laughed and started to give Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk the nice long petting she deserved.

“What happened?” Ron asked again. 

Harry pulled in a long, slow breath. “Um… it all started when I went into the Forbidden Forest, for, you know, detention. Something was killing the unicorns… and the centaurs said that it was… that it was… Vol-Voldemort.” 

Neville went very pale, and all of Harry’s friends gasped. 

“Why didn’t you tell someone?” Hermione asked, at last. 

“I- the other person, who saw it, said she would tell Dumbledore.”

“So- the reason why you were ignoring us was-” Hermione started, then gave a little sob.

Harry nodded, then took in a deep steadying breath, and forced himself to continue. “And then- well, I thought that things were all secure, but I went down to Hagrid’s after exams, and then I realized, things actually weren’t, because Hagrid had told the guy he’d gotten the egg from how to get past Fluffy…” 

“Fluffy?” Ron asked. 

“Oh, right,” Harry said. “That’s the three headed dog that Hagrid was using to guard the Stone. I discovered it pretty early in the year, but Hagrid swore me to secrecy. Anyway, I got past Fluffy, and then there was this trapdoor… I, um, I went down through it, and… there was this plant that started choking me, and, uh, I couldn’t manage to get out… I-um, that’s when Quirrel showed up… he started, uh, he st-started burning the p-plant…” Harry dug his fingers into his palms really hard, trying to steady himself. 

“You don’t have to tell us what happened if you don’t want to,” Neville said. 

“Yeah, mate,” Ron agreed. “Sorry… I didn’t realize it was…” 

“Why didn’t you tell us you were going into the third floor corridor?” Hermione blurted out. It seemed as though she’d been wanting to ask that for a while. 

“I-” Harry said, then realized he didn’t know what he was planning to say. He shook his head, staring down at his hands. “I… I guess I just… I didn’t think of it. I was just set on… on getting there as quickly as I could. I…” Harry shrugged stiffly. 

“You know you can tell us stuff, right?” Hermione said softly. “You know you can ask us for help, right?” 

Harry nodded, even more stiffly and awkwardly. 

“There are so many people you can tell, and ask for help from,” Hermione said. “You can tell Professor Flitwick, or Professor McGonagall, or even Professor Snape- I know he’s, um, kind of nasty-”

“-he’s an arsehole-” Ron put in.

“-but he’s legally obligated to make sure all of his students are safe.” Hermione nodded firmly. “And if you don’t want to tell any of them, you can tell us, right guys?” 

There was a chorus of agreement. 

“Please promise me,” Hermione said, “if something like this happens again- you’ll tell us, right? You’ll ask for help?” 

“Okay,” Harry mumbled. 

Tonks visited the next day. Her response was similar. 

“Harry,” she said slowly, running a hand through her pink curls, “I asked you to be careful. I asked you to come to me if you needed anything, or felt unsafe." She swallowed, then said, her voice cracking ever so slightly, "Why didn’t you ask me for help?” 

“I’m sorry,” Harry mumbled, feeling very small and young. “I’m- I’m sorry. I just didn’t… didn’t think. I didn’t have much time, and…” 

Tonks sighed. “I know. But… you really need to be careful. If you had asked me, I would have gone down there with you.”

Harry’s head jolted up, and he stared at her. “Really?” 

“Really,” Tonks said. Her mouth got a sort of iron set. “Seriously, Harry. I know it’s hard asking for help, especially when things get dangerous. I know we barely know each other. I won’t be here next year, I’ll be off training to be an Auror, but I can still help you. Promise me, Harry. If you feel unsafe, contact me. If you think you are likely to be physically harmed, or in danger of dying, you have to contact me. No buts, no excuses. You have to contact me. Promise me.” 

“I promise,” Harry mumbled. He couldn’t help but give her a slightly doubtful look. 

Tonks sighed. “I know. I know, I won’t be there physically to help. But I can give you advice. I can tell you what the best course of action would be. And, if the situation requires it, I promise you that I will find a way to get there to help. I promise.” 

Harry nodded and then, embarrassingly, found himself beginning to cry. He sniffled and wiped his eyes and bit his lips and tried to hold it in, but he couldn’t. Tonks pulled him in close to her, and Harry burst into real, full tears. They sat like that for a long time. 

Hagrid visited, too. This time, it wasn’t Harry crying, but rather his visitor. 

"It's -- all -- my -- ruddy -- fault!" he sobbed, huge fat tears rolling down his face and collecting in his beard. “Yeh nearly died, and it’s all my ruddy fault! I told the evil twat how ter put Fluffy ter sleep! I told him! It was the only thing he didn't know, an' I told him! Yeh nearly died! All fer a dragon egg! I'll never drink again!” 

Harry stared in shock. He’d never had someone cry in front of him, and he didn’t really know what to do, so he just pulled Hagrid into a hug, like Tonks had done to him. His arms didn’t even manage to fit around Hagrid, but it seemed to calm Hagrid down a little bit. 

"Hagrid, he'd have found out somehow, this is Voldemort we're talking about, he'd- he’d have found out even if you hadn't told him,” Harry said at last, trying to be comforting. “Please cheer up, Hagrid, the Stone is gone… have some candy, I’ve got loads more than I can eat…” 

Hagrid wiped his nose on the back of his hand and said, "That reminds me. I've got yeh a present.” The present was a beautiful, leather-bound book. It was full of wizard photographs. Smiling and waving at him from every page were his mother and father. Harry felt a powerful ache, something like sadness or happiness, or maybe both, or maybe even beyond the words used to describe emotions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's more swearing, crying and weird dream sequences than usual in this chapter, but I figure that's probably a normal response to what Harry just went through. The dream sequences were a ton of fun to write, and actually do have a purpose. Believe it or not. 
> 
> Do you guys think Madam Pompfrey believes Harry? 
> 
> I didn't expect Tonks to show up again in this chapter. It just... happened. 
> 
> Also. Almost everyone seems to agree that I should split things up by books, so that's what I'll be doing. This is the penultimate chapter of those cunning folk, and then the next book will start.


	16. where the heart is

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All good things come to an end.

To his disappointment, Harry was not allowed to go to the end of the year feast. He wasn’t there to see the Great Hall decked out in Slytherin green, but he did get to have some of the food from his feast, which he ate in bed. 

“I’ll be released soon, right?” He asked Madam Pompfrey worriedly. 

She sighed. “I suppose you will have to be… I’m still worried about your condition. You must eat properly over this summer... I will contact your family to inform them of your situation. If you do not get better, you may have to be hospitalized,” she added with a steely look. 

Harry nodded along obediently. 

Madam Pompfrey wouldn’t release Harry quite yet, but to make up for it, she let his friends spend almost as much time as they liked with him. Ron brought his chess set in, sometimes, and he would face off any challengers. Parvati tried to interpret all of their dreams, and Hermione countered by psychoanalyzing people based off of their dreams instead. 

On the day they got their exam results back, they all met in the hospital wing to open them. Harry was relieved to see that he had passed; he had even gotten surprisingly good marks. Hermione, obviously, was ranked top of the year, with Draco Malfoy just below her. Even Neville scraped through, his good Herbology mark making up for his abysmal Potions one. 

Harry was released just in time so as to be able to pack. As soon as the notes about not using magic over break arrived, he knew that summer was going to be a balancing act. 

He packed quite differently from his dormmates. He knew that there was a good likelihood that, with his magic as an empty threat he wouldn’t be able to fulfill, the Dursleys would lock up all of his school supplies out of fear. So, he carefully sorted his belongings into the things he could do without, over the summer, and the things he wasn’t willing to give up. His stash of sweets he’d gotten from his friends and admirers, his schoolbooks, quills, and parchment, his wand, the two books from the Lord of the Rings trilogy that he hadn’t read yet, and the terrarium for Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk. He knew that there was no way to manage bringing the entire terrarium, so he moved it to the pile for things he would have to do without. 

Harry packed everything but those necessities, his invisibility cloak, his school bag and his wand. He carefully packed all his necessities into his bag; it only just barely fit, but fit it did. Then, he headed to the bathroom to see if he could use the mirror to help him figure out a solution. 

When Harry hung the invisibility cloak over the bag, it made a patch of his back invisible, which obviously wouldn’t work. Next, Harry tried wrapping the invisibility cloak around the bag. This time, it worked. The bag was invisible, but Harry himself was still visible. The only problem was, the strap of Harry’s bag was still visible. It looked like there was a strap hanging off his shoulder randomly. 

The only option, Harry figured, was to wear a jacket, unzipped, over it. That way, the invisible bag wouldn’t cause a visible bulge, but the jacket would hopefully cover the strap. 

It was difficult, doing everything with an invisible bag hanging at his side that he needed to keep everyone to realize existed. Harry made sure he was wearing his muggle clothes on the day they left; changing on the train would be impossible, without his friends finding out what was going on. 

The train ride back was enjoyable all the same. They spent it talking and laughing as the countryside became greener and tidier. They pulled into platform nine and three-quarters at King's Cross Station far, far too soon. He lingered as they got off the station, trying to savor his last few moments with his friends. His stomach was a churning pit. He scratched under Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk’s chin and reminded her in a low whisper, “be on your bessst behavior, and ssstay hidden in my ssshirt…” 

Luckily for Harry, getting off the platform took some time. They had to leave in groups of twos and threes, so that none of the Muggles were alarmed or noticed what was going on. Neville’s grandmother came right on time, and he was one of the first to leave; he didn’t go through the muggle side, but rather took something called a "Floo" to his manor. 

Both the Weasleys and the Patils were rather late, so Harry, Ron, Padma, Parvati and Hermione all waited together. 

“We’re going to go to France,” Hermione was explaining excitedly. “I’m very nearly fluent, and my parents think actually visiting would really help with my accent…” 

“You should come and stay this summer,” Ron said to Harry. “I’ll send you an owl.” 

“I’d love to,” Harry said with a grin. 

Mr. and Mrs. Patil emerged from one of the Floos. Mr. Patil was tall, with dark skin, a sharp jawline, and a strong, aquline nose. Mrs. Patil had shiny, curled black hair, and was wearing a beautiful, vividly colored sari. When Parvati saw them, she rushed forward and gave each a quick hug, as well as a kiss on each cheek. Padma followed at a more sedate pace. 

“Hello, dear,” Mrs. Patil said, pressing a kiss to Padma’s forehead. “How was Hogwarts?” 

“Do you have time to meet my friends?” Parvati asked excitedly. “This is Hermione, she’s the really smart girl who told Draco Malfoy off in French, and this is Ron Weasley, and he’s Harry Potter.” 

Mrs. Patil laughed, and said, “I would love to meet anyone who told off a Malfoy, but in French, doubly so.” She began to talk to Hermione in accented, clumsy-sounding French. 

“It’s lovely to meet all of you,” Mr. Patil said, and shook each of their hands. His eyes lingered a split second longer on Harry, and he looked as though he had something he wanted to ask, which he restrained himself from saying. “I’ve heard so much,” he settled on at last. 

“Thank you, sir,” Harry said, feeling shy and young. 

Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk poked her head out of Harry’s collar, looking around curiously and sniffing slightly suspiciously. 

“And hello to your pet snake as well,” Mr. Patil said. 

“She’s not my snake,” Harry blurted. Mr. Patil raised a single dark eyebrow, and Harry mumbled, “I mean- I don’t own her. She’s my friend, not a pet.” 

A hint of a smile creased Mr. Patil’s face, and Harry had the feeling he had just passed some sort of test. “Well then,” Mr. Patil said very quietly, “hello to your sssnake friend asss well.” 

Harry’s eyes flicked up in surprise, and then he smoothed his face. “He speaksss,” Ssslshchhshkh’lsh’hhk hissed in excitement. “Properly, too. None of the accent his eggsss have…” 

“Ssshh,” was all Harry said. He gave Mr. Patil a slight smile and they both nodded to each other. 

Harry was sad to wave goodbye to the Patils. Soon after, he, Ron, and Hermione passed through the gateway together. 

“Oh, Mum, look it’s Harry Potter! I can see Harry Potter!” It was Ginny Weasley, Ron's younger sister, but she wasn't pointing at Ron. 

“Do be quiet, Ginny, and it’s rude to point,” Mrs. Weasley said, before turning her smile to the three of them. 

“Thank you for the fudge,” Harry said with an answering smile. 

"Oh, it was nothing, dear." She looked as though she was going to say something else, but then Uncle Vernon appeared on the scene. 

“Ready, boy?" Uncle Vernon asked, glancing with a mixture of nervousness and disgust at the Weasleys. His mustache was bigger and blacker than ever. Behind him, as though hiding from Harry, were Aunt Petunia and Dudley. 

“You must be Harry's family!” said Mrs. Weasley in her cheerful, friendly way. 

Uncle Vernon paused as though offended or scared, and then spat out, “In a- manner of speaking…” He turned back to Harry and said, “Hurry up, boy, we haven't got all day,” before waddling back off. 

Harry hung back, wanting to put off leaving his friends for as long as absolutely possible. “He’s mad at me for that thing with the third floor corridor,” Harry lied through his teeth. “He’s one of those more, ah, tough-love types.” 

An expression of relief on her face, Mrs. Weasley nodded. 

“See you over the summer, then.” Ron said. 

“I may be grounded,” Harry confessed, although it was more like, there’s a chance I may be forcibly locked away and unable to escape. “Hopefully not, but you know. They hate it when I make them worry. Like I said, I’d love to come over.” 

“Hope you have a good holiday,” Hermione said, pulling Harry into a tight hug. “I’ll see you on September 1st, at the latest.” 

“I will, don’t worry!” He said, pasting on another cheery grin. He gave his bag a light, subtle touch to be sure it was still all covered and intact, then turned and strode off towards the Dursleys, a forced bounce in his step and a pit of dread in his stomach.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, I just want to say- thank you guys so much for the support!! Without your comments, and kudos, I really doubt I would ever have the motivation to get so far. You guys motivate and inspire me to write better and I... I really appreciate it, even if I'm not very good at phrasing that. 
> 
> Sorry this chapter's so short, it's kind of just finishing this year off. To make up for it, I'll be posting the first chapter of the next book as well, later today.


End file.
